The witching hour

Thirty-nine

ALL RIGHT, HERE we go again, thought Rowan. It was what? The fifth gathering in honor of the engaged couple? There had been Lily’s tea, and Beatrice’s lunch, and Cecilia’s little dinner at Antoine’s. And Lauren’s little party downtown in that lovely old house on Esplanade Avenue.

And this time it was Metairie-Cortland’s house, as they still called it though it had been the home of Gifford and Ryan, and their youngest son, Pierce, for years. And the clear October day was perfect for a garden party of some two hundred.

Never mind that the wedding was only ten days away, on November 1, the Feast of All Saints. The Mayfairs would hold two more teas before then, and another lunch somewhere, the place and time to be confirmed later.

“Any excuse for a party!” Claire Mayfair had said. “Darling, you don’t know how long we’ve been waiting for something like this.”

They were milling on the open lawn now beneath the small, neatly clipped magnolia trees, and through the spacious low-ceilinged rooms of the trim brick Williamsburg house. And the dark-haired Anne Marie, a painfully honest individual who seemed now utterly enchanted by Rowan’s hospital schemes, introduced her to dozens of the same people she had seen at the funeral, and dozens more whom she’d never seen before.

Aaron had been so right in his descriptions of Metairie, an American suburb. They might have been in Beverly Hills or Sherman Oaks in Houston. Except perhaps that the sky had that glazed look she had never seen anywhere else except in the Caribbean. And the old trees that lined the curbs were as venerable as those of the Garden District.

But the house itself was pure elite suburbia with its eighteenth-century Philadelphia antiques and wall-to-wall carpet, and each family portrait carefully framed and lighted, and the soft propitiatory saxophone of Kenny G pouring from hidden speakers in the white Sheetrock walls.

A very black waiter with an extremely round head and a musical Haitian accent poured the bourbon or the white wine into the crystal glasses. Two dark-skinned female cooks in starched uniforms turned the fat pink peppered shrimp on the smoking grill. And the Mayfair women in their soft pastel dresses looked like flowers among the white-suited men, a few small toddlers romping on the grass, or sticking their tiny pink hands into the spray of the little fountain in the center of the lawn.

Rowan had found a comfortable place in a white lawn chair beneath the largest of the magnolias. She sipped her bourbon, as she shook hands with one cousin after another. She was beginning to like the taste of this poison. She was even a little high.

Earlier today, when she’d tried on the white wedding dress and veil for the final fitting, she’d found herself unexpectedly excited by the fanfare, and grateful that it had been more or less forced upon her.

“Princess for a Day,” that’s what it would be like, stepping in and out of a pageant. Even the wearing of the emerald would not really be an ordeal, especially since it had remained safely in its case since that awful night, and she’d never gotten around to telling Michael about its mysterious and unwelcome appearance. She knew that she ought to have told, and several times she’d been on the verge, but she just couldn’t do it.

Michael had been overjoyed about the church wedding, everyone could see it. His parents had been married in the parish, and so had his grandparents before that. Yes, he loved the idea, probably more than she did. And unless something else happened with that awful necklace, why spoil it all for him? Why spoil it for both of them? She could always explain afterwards, when the thing was safely locked in a vault. Yes, not a deception, just a little postponement.

Also, nothing else had happened since. No more deformed flowers on her bedside table. Indeed the time had flown, with the renovations in full swing, and the house in Florida furnished and ready for their official honeymoon.

Another good stroke of luck was that Aaron had been completely accepted by the family, and was now routinely included in every gathering. Beatrice had fallen in love with him, to hear her tell it, and teased him mercilessly about his British bachelor ways and all the eligible widows among the Mayfairs. She had even gone so far as to take him to the symphony with Agnes Mayfair, a very beautiful older cousin whose husband had died the year before.

How is he going to handle that one, Rowan wondered. But she knew by now that Aaron could ingratiate himself with God in heaven or the Devil in hell. Even Lauren, the iceberg lawyer, seemed fond of Aaron. At lunch the other day, Lauren had talked to him steadily about New Orleans history. Ryan liked him. Isaac and Wheatfield liked him. And Pierce questioned him relentlessly about his travels in Europe and the East.

Aaron was also an unfailingly faithful companion to Michael’s Aunt Vivian. Everybody ought to have an Aunt Vivian, the way Rowan figured it, a fragile little doll-like person brimming with love and sweetness who doted on Michael’s every word. She reminded Rowan of Aaron’s descriptions in the history of Millie Dear and Aunt Belle.

But the move had not been easy for Aunt Vivian. And though the Mayfairs had wined and dined her with great affection, she could not keep up with their frenetic pace and their energetic chatter. This afternoon she had begged to remain at home, sorting through the few items she’d brought with her. She was beseeching Michael to go out and pack up everything in the Liberty Street house and he was putting it off, though he and Rowan both knew such a trip was inevitable.

But to see Michael with Aunt Viv was to love him for a whole set of new reasons; for nobody could have been kinder or more patient. “She’s my only family, Rowan,” he’d remarked once. “Everybody else is gone. You know, if things hadn’t worked out with you and me, I’d be in the Talamasca now. They would have become my family.”

How well she understood; with a shock, she had been carried back by those words into her own bitter loneliness of months before.

God, how she wanted things to work here! And the ghost of First Street was keeping his counsel, as if he too wanted them to work out. Or had her anger driven him back? For days after the appearance of the necklace she had cursed him under her breath for it.

The family had even accepted the idea of the Talamasca, though Aaron was persistently vague with them about what it really was. They understood no more perhaps than that Aaron was a scholar and a world traveler, that he had always been interested in the Mayfair history because they were an old and distinguished southern family.

And any scholar who could unearth a breathtakingly beautiful ancestor named Deborah, immortalized by none other than the great Rembrandt, and authenticated beyond doubt by the appearance of the unmistakable Mayfair emerald on her breast, was their kind of historian. They were dazzled by the bits and pieces of her story as Aaron revealed them. Good Lord, they’d thought Julien made up all that foolishness about ancestors coming from Scotland.

Meantime Bea was having the photograph of the Rembrandt Deborah reproduced in oil so that it would be hanging on the wall at First Street on the day of the reception. She was furious with Ryan for not recommending the purchase of the original. But then the Talamasca wouldn’t part with the original. Thank God that after Ryan’s guess as to the inevitable price, the subject had been dropped altogether.

Yes, they loved Aaron and they loved Michael and they loved Rowan.

And they loved Deborah.

If they knew anything of what had happened between Aaron and Cortland or Carlotta years ago, they said not one word. They did not know that Stuart Townsend had been a member of the Talamasca; indeed, they were utterly confused about the discovery of that mysterious body. And it was becoming increasingly obvious that they thought Stella had been responsible for its presence.

“Probably died up there from opium or drink at one of those wild parties and she simply wrapped him up in the carpet and forgot about him.”

“Or maybe she strangled him. Remember those parties she used to give?”

It amused Rowan to listen to them talk, to hear their easy bursts of laughter. Never the slightest telepathic vibration of malice reached her. She could feel their good intentions now, their celebratory gaiety.

But they had their secrets, some of them, especially the old ones. With each new gathering, she detected stronger indications. In fact, as the date of the wedding grew closer, she felt certain that something was building.

The old ones hadn’t been stopping at First Street merely to extend their best wishes, or to marvel at the renovations. They were curious. They were fearful. There were secrets they wanted to confide, or warnings perhaps which they wanted to offer. Or questions they wanted to ask. And maybe they were testing her powers, because they indeed had powers of their own. Never had she been around people so loving and so skilled at concealing their negative emotions. It was a curious thing.

But maybe this would be the day when something unusual would happen.

So many of the old ones were here, and the liquor was flowing, and after a series of cool October days the weather was pleasantly warm again. The sky was a perfect china blue, and the great curling clouds were moving swiftly by, like graceful galleons in the thrust of a trade wind.

She took another deep drink of the bourbon, loving the burning sensation in her chest, and looked around for Michael.

There he was, still trapped as he’d been for an hour by the overwhelming Beatrice, and the strikingly handsome Gifford, whose mother had been descended from Lestan Mayfair, and whose father had been descended from Clay Mayfair, and who had married, of course, Cortland’s grandson, Ryan. Seems there were some other Mayfair lines tangled up in it, too, but Rowan had been drawn away from them at that point in the conversation, her blood simmering at the sight of Gifford’s pale fingers wound-for no good reason-around Michael’s arm.

So what did they find so fascinating about her heartthrob that they wouldn’t let him out of their clutches? And why was Gifford such a nervous woman, to begin with? Poor Michael. He didn’t know what was going on. He sat there with his gloved hands shoved in his pockets, nodding and smiling at their little jokes. He didn’t detect the flirtatious edge to their gestures, the flaming light in their eyes, the high seductive ring to their laughter.

Get used to it. The son of a bitch is irresistible to refined women. They’re all on to him now, that he’s the bodyguard who reads Dickens.

Yesterday, he’d climbed the long thin ladder up the side of the house like a pirate climbing the rope ladder of a ship. And then, the sight of him, bare-chested, with his foot on the parapet, his hair blowing, one hand raised to wave as if he had no idea in the world that this series of unself-conscious gestures was driving her slowly out of her mind. Cecilia had looked up and said, “My, but he is a good-looking man, you know.”

“Yes, I do,” Rowan had mumbled.

Her desire for him at such moments was excruciating. And he was all the more enticing in his new three-piece white linen suit (“You mean dress like an ice-cream man?”), which Beatrice had dragged him to Perlis to buy. “Darling, you’re a southern gentleman now!”

Porn, that’s what he was. Walking porn. Take the times when he rolled up his sleeves and tucked his Camel cigarettes in the right-arm fold, and put a pencil behind his ear, and stood arguing with one of the carpenters or painters, and then put one foot forward and raised his hand sharply like he was, going to push the guy’s chin through the top of his head.

And then there were the skinny dips in the pool after everybody was off the property (no ghosts since the first time), and the one weekend they’d gotten away to Florida to claim the new house, and the sight of him sleeping naked on the deck, with nothing on but the gold wristwatch, and that little chain around his neck. Pure nakedness couldn’t have been more enticing.

And he was so supremely happy! He was the only one in this world perhaps who loved that house more than the Mayfairs did. He was obsessed with it. He took every opportunity to pitch in on the job with his men. And he was stuffing the gloves away more and more often. Seems he could drain an object of the images if he really tried, and after that he’d keep it out of other hands, and it would be safe, so to speak, and now he had a whole chest of such tools which he used, barehanded, with regularity.

Thank God, the ghosts and the spooks were leaving them both alone. And she had to stop worrying about him over there with his harem.

Better to concentrate on the group gathering around her-stately old Felice had just pulled up a chair, and the pretty garrulous Margaret Ann was settling on the grass, and the dour Magdalene, the one who looked young but wasn’t, had been there for some time, watching the others in an unusual silence.

Now and then a head would turn, one of them would look at her, and she would receive some vague shimmer of clandestine knowledge, and a question perhaps, and then it would fade. But it was always one of the older ones-Felice, who was Barclay’s youngest daughter and seventy-five years old, or Lily, seventy-eight, they said, and the granddaughter of Vincent, or the elderly bald-headed Peter Mayfair, with the wet shining eyes and the thick neck though his body was very straight and strong-Garland’s youngest son, surely a wary and knowing elder.

And then there was Randall, older perhaps than his uncle Peter, saggy-eyed and seemingly wise, slouched on an iron bench in the far corner, gazing at her steadily, no matter how many blocked his view from time to time, as if he wanted to tell her something of great importance but did not know how to begin it.

I want to know. I want to know everything.

Pierce now looked at her with undisguised awe, utterly won over to the dream of Mayfair Medical, and almost as eager as she was to make it a reality. Too bad he’d lost some of the easy warmth he’d shown before, and was almost apologetic as he brought a succession of young men to be introduced, briefly explaining the lineage and present occupation of each one. (“We’re a family of lawyers, or What does a gentleman do when he doesn’t have to do anything?”) There was something utterly lovable about Pierce as far as she was concerned. She wanted to put him at ease again. His was a friendliness behind which there was not a single shadow of self-centeredness.

She noted with pleasure as well that after each introduction, he presented the very same person to Michael with a simple, unexplained cordiality. In fact, all of them were being gracious to Michael. Gifford kept pouring the bourbon in his glass. And Anne Marie had now settled beside him and was talking intently to him, her shoulder brushing his shoulder.

Turn it off, Rowan. You can’t lock up the beautiful beast in the attic.

In clusters they surrounded her, then broke away so that a new cluster might form. And all the while they talked about the house on First Street, above all about the house.

For the ongoing restoration of First Street brought them undisguised joy.

First Street was their landmark, all right, and how they had hated to see it falling down, how they had hated Carlotta. Rowan caught it behind their congratulatory words. She tasted it when she looked into their eyes. The house was free at last from despicable bondage. And it was amazing how much they knew about the very latest changes and discoveries. They even knew the colors Rowan had chosen for rooms they hadn’t yet seen.

So splendid that Rowan had kept all the old bedroom furniture. Did she know that Stella had once slept in Carlotta’s bed? And the bed in Millie’s room had belonged to Grandmère Katherine, and Great Oncle Julien had been born in the bed in the front room, which was to be Rowan and Michael’s bed.

What did they think about her plan for the great hospital? In her few brief conversations outside the firm, she’d found them amazingly receptive. The name, Mayfair Medical, delighted them.

It was crucial to her that the center break new ground, she’d explained last week to Bea and Cecilia, that it fulfill needs which others had not addressed. The ideal environment for research, yes, that was mandatory, but this was to be no ivory tower institute. It was to be a true hospital with a large proportion of its beds committed to nonpaying patients. If it could draw together the top neurologists and neurosurgeons in the nation and become the most innovative, effective, and complete center for the treatment of neurological problems, in unparalleled comfort and with the very latest equipment, it would be her dream come true.

“Sounds quite terrific if you ask me,” Cecilia had said.

“It’s about time, I think,” said Carmen Mayfair over lunch, “You know, Mayfair and Mayfair has always given away millions, but this is the first time anyone has shown this sort of initiative.”

And of course that was only the beginning. No need to explain yet that she foresaw experiments in the structure and arrangement of intensive care units, and critical care wards, that she wanted to devise revolutionary housing for the families of patients, with special educational programs for spouses and children who must participate in the ongoing rehabilitation of those with incurable diseases or disabilities.

But each day her vision gained new momentum. She dreamed of a humanizing teaching program designed to correct all the horrors and abuses which had become the clichés of modern medicine; she planned a nursing school in which a new type of supernurse, capable of a whole range of new responsibilities, could be created.

The words “Mayfair Medical” could become synonymous with the finest and most humane and sensitive practitioners in the profession.

Yes, they would all be proud. How could they not be?

“Another drink?”

“Yes, thank you. Bourbon will be fine. Too fine.”

Laughter.

She took another sip as she nodded now to young Timmy Mayfair, who had come to shake hands. Yes, and hello again to Bernardette Mayfair, whom she’d met briefly at the funeral, and to the beautiful little red-haired girl with the hair ribbon, who was named Mona Mayfair, daughter of CeeCee, yes, and the tomboyish Jennifer Mayfair, Mona’s best friend and fourth cousin, yes, met you before, of course. Jenn had a voice like her own, she thought, deep and husky.

Bourbon was better when it was very cold. But it was also sneaky when it was cold. And she knew she was drinking just a little too much of it. She took another sip, acknowledging a little toast from across the garden. One toast after another was being made to the house, and to the marriage. Was anybody here talking about anything else?

“Rowan, I have photographs that go all the way back-”

“ … and my mother saved all the articles from the papers … ”

“You know, it’s in the books on New Orleans, oh, yes, I have some of the very old books, I can drop them off for you at the hotel … ”

“ … you understand, we are not going to be knocking on the door day and night, but just to know! … ”

“Rowan, our great-grandfathers were born in that house … all the people you see here were … ”

“Oh, poor Millie Dear never lived to see the day … ”

“ … a package of daguerreotypes … Katherine and Darcy, and Julien. You know Julien was always photographed at the front door. I have seven different pictures of him at the front door.”

The front door?

More and more Mayfairs streamed in. And there at last was the elderly Fielding-Clay’s son-utterly bald, and with his fine, translucent skin and red-rimmed eyes-and they were bringing him here, to sit beside her.

No sooner had he eased down in the chair than the young ones began to appear to pay court to him as they had to her.

Hercules, the Haitian servant, put the tumbler of bourbon in the old man’s hand.

“You got that now, Mr. Fielding?”

“Yes, Hercules, no food! I’m sick of food. I’ve eaten enough food for a lifetime.”

His voice was deep, and ageless the way the old woman’s voice had been.

“And so no more Carlotta,” he said grimly to Beatrice, who had come to kiss him. “And I’m the only old one left.”

“Don’t talk about it, you’re going to be with us forever,” said Bea, her perfume swirling about them, sweet and floral, and expensive like her brilliant red silk dress.

“I don’t know that you’re all that much older than I am,” declared Lily Mayfair, sitting beside him, and indeed for a moment she did seem as old as he was, with her wispy luminous white hair and sunken cheeks, and the bony hand she laid on his arm.

Fielding turned to Rowan. “So you’re restoring First Street. You and that man of yours are going to live there. And so far things have gone well?”

“Why shouldn’t they?” Rowan asked with a gentle smile.

But she was warmed suddenly by the blessing Fielding gave her as he rested his hand on her own.

“Splendid news, Rowan,” he said, his low voice gaining resonance now that he had caught his breath after the long odyssey from the front door. “Splendid news.” The whites of his eyes were yellowed, though his false teeth were shining white. “All those years, she wouldn’t let anyone touch it,” he said with a touch of anger. “Old witch, that’s what she was.”

Little gasps rose from the women gathered to the left. Ah, but this was what Rowan wanted. Let the polished surface be broken.

“Granddaddy, for heaven’s sakes.” It was Gifford at his elbow. She picked up his fallen cane from the grass and hooked it over the back of the chair. He ignored her.

“Well, it’s the truth,” he said. “She let it fall to ruin! It’s a wonder it can be restored at all.”

“Granddaddy,” said Gifford, almost desperately.

“Oh, let him talk, darling,” said Lily, with a little palsy to her small head, eyes flickering over Rowan, her thin hand knotted around her drink.

“You think anyone could shut me up,” said the old man. “She said he was the one who wouldn’t let her, she blamed it all on him. She believed in him and used him when she had her reasons.”

A hush was falling over those around them. It seemed the light died a little as the others pressed in. Rowan was vaguely aware that the dark gray figure of Randall was moving in the corner of her eye.

“Granddaddy, I wish you wouldn’t … ” said Gifford.

Oh, but I wish you would!

“She was the one,” Fielding said. “She wanted it to fall down around her. I wonder sometimes why she didn’t burn it, like that wicked housekeeper in Rebecca. I used to worry that she’d do it. That she’d burn all the old pictures. You see the pictures? You see Julien and his sons standing in front of the doorway?”

“The doorway. You mean the keyhole door at the front of the house?”

Had Michael heard him? Yes, he was coming towards them, obviously trying to silence Cecilia who whispered nonstop in his ear, oblivious to the dazed expression on his face, and Aaron stood not very far away, under the magnolia, unnoticed, eyes fixed on the group. If only she could put a spell on them so that they didn’t see Aaron.

But they weren’t noticing anything except each other, Fielding nodding, and Felice speaking up, her silver bracelets jangling as she pointed at Fielding.

“Tell her about it,” said Felice, “I say you should. You want my opinion? Carlotta wanted that house. She wanted to rule in that house. She was mistress of it till the day she died, wasn’t she?”

“She didn’t want anything,” grumbled Fielding, with a flopping dismissive gesture of his left hand. “That was her curse. She only wanted to destroy.”

“What about the doorway?” asked Rowan.

“Granddaddy, I’m going to take you … ”

“You’re not going to take me anywhere, Gifford,” he said, his voice almost youthful in its determination. “Rowan’s moving back into that house. I have things to say to Rowan.”

“In private!” Gifford declared.

“Let him talk, darling, what’s the harm?” said Lily. “And this is private. We’re all Mayfairs here.”

“It’s a beautiful house, she’ll love it!” said Magdalene sharply. “What are you all trying to do, scare her?”

Randall stood behind Magdalene, eyebrows raised, lips slightly pursed, all the wrinkles of his saggy old face drawn long and deep, as he looked down at Fielding.

“But what were you going to say?” asked Rowan.

“It’s just a package of old legends,” said Ryan, with a faint touch of irritation, though he spoke more slowly, obviously trying to hold it in. “Stupid old legends about a doorway and they don’t mean anything.”

Michael drew up behind Fielding, and Aaron came a little closer. Still they took no notice.

“I want to know, actually,” said Pierce. He was standing to the left behind Felice and beside Randall. Felice stared intently at Fielding, her head wagging ever so slightly because she was drunk. “My great-grandfather was painted in front of the doorway,” said Pierce. “That portrait’s inside. They were always in front of that doorway.”

“And why shouldn’t they stand on the front porch of the house in these pictures?” asked Ryan. “They lived there. We have to remember, before Carlotta it was our great-great-grandfather’s house.”

“That’s it,” Michael murmured. “That’s where I saw the door. In the pictures. God, I should have taken a closer look at those pictures … ”

Ryan glanced at him. Rowan reached out for him, gestured for him to come to her, and Ryan’s eyes followed as Michael came around to the back of Rowan’s chair. Pierce was talking again as Michael slipped down on the grass beside Rowan, so that she could rest her hand on his shoulder. Aaron now stood quite close by.

“But even in the old photos,” Pierce was saying, “they’re in front of the door. Always a keyhole door. Either the front door or one of the doors … ”

“Yes, the door,” said Lily. “And the door’s on the grave. The same keyhole doorway carved right above the crypts. And nobody even knows who had it done.”

“Well, it was Julien, of course,” said Randall in a low stentorian voice. They all paid a quick heed to him. “And Julien knew what he was doing, because the doorway had a special meaning for him, and for all of them back then.”

“If you tell her all this craziness,” said Anne Marie, “she isn’t going to … ”

“Oh, but I want to know,” said Rowan. “And besides, nothing could prevent us from moving into the house.”

“Don’t be so sure of that,” said Randall solemnly.

Lauren threw him a cold disapproving glance. “This is no time for scary tales,” she whispered.

“Do we have to drag up all this dirt!” cried Gifford. The woman was clearly upset. Rowan could see Pierce’s concern. But he was on the very opposite side of the little gathering from his mother. Ryan was close to her. Ryan took her arm, and whispered something in her ear.

She’s going to try to break this up, Rowan thought. “What does the doorway mean?” Rowan asked. “Why did they always stand in front of it?”

“I don’t like to talk about it,” Gifford cried. “I don’t see why we have to dig up the past every time we get together. We ought to be thinking about the future.”

“We are talking about the future,” said Randall. “The young woman ought to know certain things.”

“I’d like to know about the door,” said Rowan.

“Well, go on, all of you, old mossbacks,” said Felice. “If you mean to tell something finally after all these years of acting like the kitten who got the cream … ”

“The doorway had to do with the pact and the promise,” said Fielding. “And it was a secret handed down in each generation all the way from the very earliest times.”

Rowan glanced down at Michael, who sat with knees up and his arms resting on them, merely looking up at Fielding. But even from above, she could see the expression of dread and confusion in his face, the same damned expression that came over him every time he talked of the visions. The expression was so uncharacteristic that he looked like someone else.

“I never heard them speak of any promise,” said Cecilia. “Or pact, or any doorway, for that matter.”

Peter Mayfair now joined them, bald as Fielding, and with the same sharp eyes. In fact, all of them were gathering in a circle, three and four deep. Isaac and Wheatfield crowded in behind Pierce.

“That’s because they didn’t speak of it,” said Peter in a quavering and slightly theatrical voice. “It was their secret, and they didn’t want anyone to know.”

“But who do you mean, they?” asked Ryan. “Are you talking about my grandfather?” His voice was slightly slurred from his drinking. He took a hasty swallow. “You are talking about Cortland, aren’t you?”

“I don’t want to … ” whispered Gifford, but Ryan gestured for her to be silent.

Fielding also motioned for Gifford to be quiet. In fact, the glance he threw her was vicious.

“Cortland was one of them, of course,” said Fielding, looking up at bald-headed Peter, “and everybody knew he was.”

“Oh, that’s a dreadful thing to say,” said Magdalene angrily. “I loved Cortland.”

“Many of us loved Cortland,” said Peter angrily. “I would have done anything for Cortland, but Cortland was one of them. He was. And so was your father, Ryan. Big Pierce was one of them as long as Stella was living, and so was Randall’s father. Isn’t that so?”

Randall gave a weary nod, taking a slow sip of his bourbon, the dark-faced servant going unnoticed as he refilled Randall’s glass and quietly poured splashes of golden bourbon in others.

“What do you mean, one of them?” Pierce demanded. “I’ve been hearing this all my life, one of them, not one of them, what does it mean?”

“Nothing,” said Ryan. “They had a club, a social club.”

“The hell they did,” said Randall.

“That all died with Stella,” said Magdalene. “My mother was close to Stella, she went to those parties, there were no thirteen witches! That was all bunk.”

“Thirteen witches?” asked Rowan. She could feel the tenseness in Michael. Through a small break in the circle she could see Aaron, who had turned his back to the tree and was looking up at the sky as if he couldn’t hear them, but she knew that he could.

“Part of the legend,” said Fielding, coldly, firmly, as if to distinguish himself from those around him, “part of the story of the doorway and the pact.”

“What was the story?” asked Rowan.

“That they would all be saved by the doorway and the thirteen witches,” said Fielding, looking up once more at Peter. “That was the story, and that was the promise.”

Randall shook his head. “It was a riddle. Stella never knew for sure what it meant.”

“Saved?” asked young Wheatfield. “You mean like a Christian being saved?”

“Saved! Hallelujah!” said Margaret Ann, and downed her drink, spilling a few drops of it on her dress. “The Mayfairs are going to heaven. I knew with all this money, somebody would work something out!”

“You’re drunk, Margaret Ann,” whispered Cecilia. “And so am I!”

They touched their glasses in a toast.

“Stella was trying to get together the thirteen witches at those parties?” asked Rowan.

“Yes,” said Fielding. “That was exactly what she was trying to do. She called herself a witch, and so did Mary Beth, her mother, she never made any bones about it, she said she had the power, and she could see ‘the man.’ ”

“I’m not going to allow this … ” said Gifford, her voice rising hysterically.

“Why? Why is it so scary?” asked Rowan softly. “Why isn’t it just old legends? And who is ‘the man’!”

Silence. They were all studying her, each waiting perhaps for the other to speak. Lauren looked almost angry as she stared at Rowan. Lily looked faintly suspicious. They knew she was deceiving them.

“You know it’s not old legends,” said Fielding under his breath.

“Because they believed it!” said Gifford, her chin raised, her lip trembling. “Because people have done bad things in the name of believing this old foolishness.”

“But what bad things?” asked Rowan. “You mean what Carlotta did to my mother?”

“I mean the things that Cortland did,” said Gifford. She was shaking now, clearly on the edge of hysterics. “That’s what I mean.” She glared at Ryan, and then at her son, Pierce, and then back at Rowan. “And yes, Carlotta too. They all betrayed your mother. Oh, there are so many things you don’t know.”

“Shhhh, Gifford, too much to drink,” whispered Lily.

“Go inside, Gifford,” said Randall.

Ryan took his wife by the arm, bending to whisper in her ear. Pierce left his place and came around to assist. Together they drew Gifford away from the group.

Felice was whispering anxiously to Magdalene, and someone on the edge of the circle was trying to gather up all the children and get them to come away. A little girl in a pinafore was saying, “I want to know … ”

“I want to know,” said Rowan. “What did they do?”

“Yes, tell us about Stella,” said Beatrice, glancing uneasily at Gifford, who was now crying against Ryan’s shoulder as he tried to lead her farther away.

“They believed in Black Magic, that’s what they did,” said Fielding, “and they believed in the thirteen witches and the doorway, but they never figured out how to make it all work.”

“Well, what did they think it meant?” asked Beatrice. “I think all this is fascinating. Do tell.”

“And you’ll tell it to the whole country club,” said Randall, “just the way you always have.”

“And why shouldn’t I?” said Beatrice. “Is somebody going to come burn one of us at the stake!”

Gifford was being forced into the house by Ryan. Pierce closed the French doors behind them.

“No, I want to know,” said Beatrice, stepping forward and folding her arms. “Stella didn’t know the meaning? Well, who did?”

“Julien,” said Peter. “My grandfather. He knew. He knew and he told Mary Beth. He left it in writing, but Mary Beth destroyed the written record, and she told it to Stella but Stella never really understood.”

“Stella never paid attention to anything,” said Fielding.

“No, never to anything at all,” said Lily sadly. “Poor Stella. She thought it was all parties, and bootleg liquor and her crazy friends.”

“She didn’t believe it all really,” said Fielding. “That was the problem right there. She wanted to play with it. And when something went wrong, she became afraid, and drowned her fears in her bootleg champagne. She saw things that would have convinced anyone, but still she didn’t believe in the doorway or the promise or the thirteen witches until it was too late and Julien and Mary Beth were both gone.”

“So she broke the chain of information?” Rowan asked. “That’s what you’re saying. They’d given her secrets along with the necklace and everything else?”

“The necklace was never all that important,” said Lily. “Carlotta made a big fuss about the necklace. It’s just that you can’t take the necklace away … well, you’re not supposed to take the necklace from the one who inherits it. It’s your necklace and Carlotta had the idea that if she locked up the necklace, she’d put an end to all the strange goings-on, and she made that another one of her useless little battles.”

“And Carlotta knew,” said Peter, glancing a little contemptuously at Fielding. “She knew what the doorway and the thirteen witches meant.”

“How do you know that?” It was Lauren speaking from a slight distance. “Carlotta certainly never talked of anything like that.”

“Of course not, why would she?” said Peter. “I know because Stella told my mother. Carlotta knew and Carlotta wouldn’t help her. Stella was trying to fulfill the old prophecy. And it had nothing to do, by the way, with salvation or hallelujahs. That wasn’t the point at all.”

“Says who?” demanded Fielding.

“Says I, that’s who.”

“Well, what do you know about it?” asked Randall softly with a little touch of sarcasm in his voice. “Cortland himself told me that when they brought the thirteen witches together, the doorway would open between the worlds.”

“Between the worlds!” Peter scoffed. “And what has that got to do with salvation I’d like to know? Cortland didn’t know anything. Any more than Stella. With Cortland it was all after the fact. If Cortland had known he would have helped Stella. Cortland was there. So was I.”

“There when?” asked Fielding scornfully.

“You don’t mean Stella’s parties,” asked Lily.

“Stella was trying to discover the meaning when she held the parties,” said Peter. “And I was there.”

“I never knew that,” said Magdalene. “I never knew you went.”

“How could you have been there?” asked Margaret Ann. “That was a hundred years ago.”

“Oh, no it wasn’t. It was 1928, and I was there,” said Peter. “I was twelve years old when I went, and my father was furious with my mother for allowing it, but I was there. And so was Lauren. Lauren was four years old.”

Lauren gave a little subdued nod of her head. Her eyes seemed dreamy, as if she remembered, but she did not share the drama of the moment.

“Stella picked thirteen of us,” said Peter, “and it was based on our powers-you know, the old psychic gifts-to read minds, to see spirits, and to move matter.”

“And I suppose you can do all that,” scoffed Fielding. “And that’s why I always beat you at poker.”

Peter shook his head. “There wasn’t anyone who could do it like Stella. Except Cortland, perhaps, but even he was weaker than Stella. And then there was Big Pierce, he had the touch, he really did, but he was young and entirely under Stella’s domination. The rest of us were merely the best she could muster. That’s why she had to have Lauren. Lauren had a strong touch of it, and Stella didn’t want to waste even that much of a chance. And we were all gathered together in that house, and the purpose was to open the doorway. And when we formed our circle and we began to envision the purpose, he was to appear, and he was to come through and be there with us. And he wouldn’t be a ghost anymore. He’d be entering into this very world.”

A little hush fell over them. Beatrice stared at Peter as if he himself were a ghost. Fielding too studied Peter with seeming incredulity and maybe even a sneer.

Randall’s face was impassive, behind its massive wrinkles.

“Rowan doesn’t know what you’re talking about,” said Lily.

“No, and I think we should stop all this,” said Anne Marie.

“She knows,” said Randall, looking directly at Rowan.

Rowan looked at Peter. “What do you mean that he would come into this very world?” she asked.

“He wouldn’t be a spirit any longer, that’s what I mean. Not just to appear but to remain, to be … physical.”

Randall was studying Rowan, as if there was something he couldn’t quite determine.

Fielding gave a dry little laugh, a superior laugh. “Stella must have made up that part. That wasn’t what my father told me. Saved, that’s what he said. All those who were part of the pact would be saved. I remember hearing him tell my mother.”

“What else did your father tell you?” Rowan asked.

“Oh, you don’t believe all this!” asked Beatrice. “Good Lord, Rowan.”

“Don’t take it seriously, Rowan!” said Anne Marie.

“Stella was a sad case, my dear,” said Lily.

Fielding shook his head. “Saved, that’s what my father said. They’d all be saved when the doorway was opened. And it was a riddle, and Mary Beth didn’t know the real meaning any more than anyone else. Carlotta swore she’d figured it out, but that wasn’t true. She only wanted to torment Stella. I don’t even think Julien knew.”

“Do you know the words of the riddle?” Michael asked.

Fielding turned to the left and glanced down at him. And suddenly they all appeared to notice Michael, and to focus upon him. Rowan slipped her hand closer to his neck, clasping it affectionately and drawing her legs closer to him, as if embracing him and declaring him part of her.

“Yes, what were the words of the riddle?” Rowan asked.

Randall looked at Peter, and they both looked at Fielding.

Again Fielding shook his head. “I never knew. I never heard there were any special words. It was just that when there were thirteen witches, the doorway would be opened at last. And the night that Julien died, my father said, ‘They’ll never get the thirteen now, not without Julien.’ ”

“And who told them the riddle?” asked Rowan. “Was it ‘the man’?”

They were all staring at her again. Even Anne Marie appeared apprehensive and Beatrice at a loss, as if someone had made a fearful breach of etiquette. Lauren was gazing at her in the strangest way.

“She doesn’t even know what this is all about,” declared Beatrice.

“I think we should forget it,” said Felice.

“Why? Why should we forget it?” asked Fielding. “You don’t think ‘the man’ will come to her as he came to all the others? What’s changed?”

“You’re scaring her!” declared Cecilia. “And frankly you’re scaring me.”

“Was it ‘the man’ who gave them the riddle?” Rowan asked again.

No one spoke.

What could she say to make them start talking again, to make them yield up what they possessed. “Carlotta told me about ‘the man,’ ” Rowan said. “I’m not afraid of him.”

How still the garden seemed. Every single one of them was gathered into the circle except for Ryan, who had taken Gifford away. Even Pierce had returned and stood just behind Peter. It was almost twilight. And the servants had vanished, as if they knew they were not wanted.

Anne Marie picked up a bottle from the nearby table, and with a loud gurgling noise filled her glass. Someone else reached for a bottle. And then another. But the eyes of all remained fixed upon Rowan.

“Do you all want me to be afraid?” Rowan asked.

“No, of course not,” said Lauren.

“Indeed not!” said Cecilia. “I think this sort of talk could ruin everything.”

“ … in a big shadowy old house like that.”

“ … nonsense if you ask me.”

Randall shook his head; Peter murmured no, but Fielding merely looked at her.

Again the silence came, blanketing the group, as if it were snow. A rustling darkness seemed to be gathering under the small trees. A light had gone on across the lawn, behind the small panes of the French windows.

“Have any of you ever seen ‘the man’?” Rowan asked.

Peter’s face was solemn and unreadable. He did not seem to notice when Lauren poured the bourbon in his glass.

“God, I wish I could see him,” said Pierce, “just once!”

“So do I!” said Beatrice. “I wouldn’t think of trying to get rid of him. I’d talk to him.… ”

“Oh shut up, Bea!” said Peter suddenly. “You don’t know what you’re saying. You never do!”

“And you do, I suppose,” said Lily sharply, obviously protective of Bea. “Come here, Bea, sit down with the women. If it’s going to be war, be on the right side.”

Beatrice sat down on the grass beside Lily’s chair. “You old idiot, I hate you,” she said to Peter. “I’d like to see what you’d do if you ever saw ‘the man.’ ”

He dismissed her with a raised eyebrow, and took another sip of his drink.

Fielding sneered, muttering something under his breath.

“I’ve gone up there to First Street,” said Pierce, “and hung around that iron fence for hours on end trying to see him. If only I’d ever caught one glimpse.”

“Oh, for the love of heaven!” declared Anne Marie. “As if you didn’t have anything better to do.”

“Don’t let your mother hear that,” Isaac murmured.

“You all believe in him,” Rowan said. “Surely some of you have seen him.”

“What would make you think that!” Felice laughed.

“My father says it’s a fantasy, an old tale,” said Pierce.

“Pierce, the best thing you could do,” said Lily, “is stop taking every word that falls from your father’s lips as if it were gospel because it is not.”

“Have you seen him, Aunt Lily?” Pierce asked.

“Indeed, I have, Pierce,” Lily said in a low voice. “Indeed I have.”

The others registered undisguised surprise, except for the three elder men, who exchanged glances. Fielding’s left hand fluttered, as if he wanted to gesture, speak, but he didn’t.

“He’s real,” said Peter gravely. “He’s as real as lightning; as real as wind is real.” He turned and glared at young Pierce and then back at Rowan, as if demanding their undivided attention and belief in him. Then his eyes settled on Michael. “I’ve seen him. I saw him that night when Stella brought us together. I’ve seen him since. Lily’s seen him. So has Lauren. You, too, Felice, I know you have. And ask Carmen. Why don’t you speak up, Felice? And you, Fielding. You saw him the night Mary Beth died at First Street. You know you did. Who here hasn’t seen him? Only the younger ones.” He looked at Rowan. “Ask, they’ll all tell you.”

A loud murmuring ran through the outer edges of the gathering because many of the younger ones-Polly and Clancy and Tim and others Rowan did not know-hadn’t seen the ghost, and didn’t know whether to believe what they were hearing. Little Mona with the ribbon in her hair suddenly pushed to the front of the circle, with the taller Jennifer right behind her.

“Tell me what you saw,” said Rowan, looking directly at Peter. “You’re not saying that he came through the door the night that Stella gathered you together.”

Peter took his time. He looked around him, eyes lingering on Margaret Ann, and then for a moment on Michael, and then on Rowan. He lifted his drink. He drained the glass, and then spoke:

“He was there-a blazing shimmering presence, and for those few moments, I could have sworn he was as solid as any man of flesh and blood I’ve ever seen. I saw him materialize. I felt the heat when he did it. And I heard his steps. Yes, I heard his feet strike the floor of that front hallway as he walked towards us. He stood there, just as real as you or me, and he looked at each and every one of us.” Again, he lifted his glass, took a swallow and lowered, it, his eyes running over the little assembly. He sighed. “And then he vanished, just as he always had. The heat again. The smell of smoke, and the breeze rushing through the house, tearing the very curtains off the windows. But he was gone. He couldn’t hold it. And we weren’t strong enough to help him hold it. Thirteen of us, yes, the thirteen witches, as Stella called us. And Lauren four years old! Little Lauren. But we weren’t of the ilk of Julien or Mary Beth, or old Grandmère Marguerite at Riverbend. And we couldn’t do it. And Carlotta, Carlotta who was stronger than Stella-and you mark my words, it was true-Carlotta wouldn’t help. She lay on her bed upstairs, staring at the ceiling, and she was saying her rosary aloud, and after every Hail Mary, she said, Send him back to hell, send him back to hell! – and then went on to the next Hail Mary.”

He pursed his lips and scowled down into the empty glass, shaking it soundlessly so that the ice cubes revolved. Then again, his eyes ran over the circle, taking in everyone, even little red-haired Mona.

“For the record, Peter Mayfair saw him,” Peter declared, pulling himself up, eyebrow raised again. “Lauren and Lily can speak for themselves. So can Randall. But for the record, I saw him, and that you may tell to your grandchildren.”

A pause again. The darkness was growing dense; and from far away came the grinding cry of the cicadas. No breeze touched the yard. The house was now full of yellow light, in all its many small neat windows.

“Yes,” said Lily with a sigh. “You might as well know it, my dear.” Her eyes fixed on Rowan as she smiled. “He is there. And we’ve all seen him many a time since, though not perhaps the way we saw him that night, or for so long, or so clearly.”

“You were there, too?” Rowan asked.

“I was,” said Lily. “But it wasn’t only then, Rowan. We’ve seen him on that old screen porch with Deirdre.” She looked up at Lauren. “We’ve seen him when we’ve passed the house. We’ve seen him sometimes when we didn’t want to.”

“Don’t be frightened of him, Rowan,” said Lauren contemptuously.

“Oh, now you tell her that,” declared Beatrice. “You superstitious monsters!”

“Don’t let them drive you out of the house,” said Magdalene quickly.

“No, don’t let us do that,” said Felice. “And you want my advice, forget the legends. Forget the old foolishness about the thirteen witches and the doorway. And forget about him! He’s just a ghost, and nothing more, and you may think that sounds strange, but truly it isn’t.”

“He can’t do anything to you,” said Lauren, with a sneer.

“No, he can’t,” said Felice. “He’s like the breeze.”

“He’s a ghost,” said Lily. “That’s all he is and all he’ll ever be.”

“And who knows?” asked Cecilia. “Maybe he’s no longer even there.”

They all stared at her.

“Well, nobody’s seen him since Deirdre died.”

A door slammed. There was a tinkling sound, of glass falling, and a commotion on the edge of the circle. People shifted, stepped aside. Gifford pushed her way to the center, her face wet and stained, her hands shaking.

“Can’t do anything! Can’t hurt anyone! Is that what you’re telling her! Can’t do anything! He killed Cortland, that’s what he did! After Cortland raped your mother! Did you know that, Rowan!”

“Hush, Gifford!” Fielding roared.

“Cortland was your father,” Gifford screamed. “The hell he can’t do anything! Drive him out, Rowan! Turn your strength on him and drive him out! Exorcise the house! Burn it down if you have to … Burn it down!”

A roar of protest came from all directions, and vague expressions of scorn or outrage. Ryan had appeared and was trying once more to restrain Gifford. She turned and slapped his face. Gasps came from all around. Pierce was obviously mortified and helpless.

Lily rose and left the group, and so did Felice, who almost fell in her haste. Anne Marie struggled to her feet, and helped Felice to get away. But the others stood firm, including Ryan, who simply wiped his face with his handkerchief, as if to regain his composure while Gifford stood with her fists clenched, lips trembling. Beatrice was clearly desperate to help but didn’t know what to do.

Rowan rose and went towards Gifford.

“Gifford, listen to me,” said Rowan. “Don’t be afraid. It’s the future we care about, not the past.” She took Gifford by both arms, and reluctantly Gifford looked up into her face. “I will do what’s good,” said Rowan, “and what’s right, and what’s good and right for the family. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

Gifford broke into sobs, her head bent again as if her neck were too weak to hold it. Her hair fell down into her eyes. “Only evil people can be happy in that house,” she said. “And they were evil-Cortland was evil!” Both Pierce and Ryan had their arms around her. Ryan was becoming angry. But Rowan hadn’t let her go.

“Too much to drink,” said Cecilia. Someone had thrown on the yard lights.

Gifford appeared to collapse suddenly, but still Rowan held her.

“No, listen to me, please, Gifford,” Rowan said, but she was really speaking to the others. She saw Lily standing only a short distance away, and Felice beside her. She saw Beatrice’s eyes fixed on her. And Michael was standing, watching her, as he stood behind Fielding’s chair.

“I’ve been listening to you all,” said Rowan, “and learning from you. But I have something to say. The way to survive this strange spirit and his machinations is to see him in a large perspective. Now, the family, and life itself, are part of that perspective. And he must never be allowed to shrink the family or shrink the possibilities of life. If he exists as you say he does, then he belongs in the shadows.”

Randall and Peter were watching her intently. So was Lauren. Aaron stood very near to Michael, and he too was listening. Only Fielding seemed cold, and sneering, and did not look at Rowan. Gifford was staring at her in a daze.

“I think Mary Beth and Julien knew that,” said Rowan. “I mean to follow their example. If something appears to me out of the shadows at First Street, no matter how mysterious it might be, it won’t eclipse the greater scheme, the greater light. Surely you follow my meaning.”

Gifford seemed almost spellbound. And very slowly Rowan realized how peculiar this moment had become. She realized how strange her words seemed; and how strange she must have appeared to all of them, making this unusual speech while she held this frail, hysterical woman by both arms.

Indeed they were all staring at her as if they too had been spellbound.

Gently she let Gifford go. Gifford stepped backwards, and into Ryan’s embrace, but her eyes remained large, empty, and fixed on Rowan.

“I’m frightening you, aren’t I?” asked Rowan.

“No, no everything is all right now,” said Ryan.

“Yes, everything’s fine,” said Pierce.

But Gifford was silent. They were all confused. When Rowan looked at Michael she saw the same dazed expression, and behind it the old dark turbulent distress.

Beatrice murmured some little apology for all that had happened; she stepped up and led Gifford away. Ryan went with them. And Pierce remained, motionless, struck dumb.

Lily looked around, apparently confused for a moment, and then called to Hercules to please find her coat.

Randall, Fielding, and Peter remained in the stillness. Others lingered in the shadows. The little girl with the ribbon stared from a distance, her round sweet young face like a flame in the dark. The taller child, Jenn, appeared to be crying.

Suddenly Peter clasped Rowan’s hand.

“You’re wise in what you said. You’d waste your life if you got caught up in it.”

“That’s correct,” said Randall. “That’s what happened to Stella. Same thing with Carlotta. She wasted her life! Same thing.” But he was anxious, and only too ready to withdraw. He turned and slipped off without a farewell.

“Come on, young man, help me up,” said Fielding to Michael. “The party’s over, and by the way, my congratulations on the marriage. Maybe I’ll live long enough to see the wedding. And please, don’t invite the ghost.”

Michael looked disoriented. He glanced at Rowan, and then down at the old man, and then very gently he helped the old man to his feet. Then he looked at Rowan again. The confusion and dread were there as before.

Several of the young ones approached, to tell Rowan not to be discouraged by all this Mayfair madness. Anne Marie begged her to go on with her plans. A light breeze came at last with just a touch of coolness to it.

“Everybody will be heartbroken if you don’t move into the house,” said Margaret Ann.

“You’re not giving it up?” demanded Clancy.

“Of course not,” said Rowan with a smile. “What an absurd idea.”

Aaron stood watching Rowan impassively. And Beatrice came back now with a flood of apologies on behalf of Gifford, begging Rowan not to be upset.

The others were coming back; they had their raincoats, purses, whatever they had gone to gather. It was full dark now; and the air was cool, deliciously cool. And the party was over.

For thirty minutes, the cousins said their good-byes, all issuing the same warnings. Stay, don’t go. Restore the house. Forget all the old talk.

And Ryan apologized for Gifford and for the awful things she’d said. Surely Rowan must not take Gifford’s words as truth. Rowan waved it away.

“Thank you, thank you very much for everything,” said Rowan. “And don’t worry. I wanted to know the old stories. I wanted to know what the family was saying. And now I do.”

“There’s no ghost up there,” said Ryan, looking her directly in the eye.

Rowan didn’t bother to answer.

“You’re going to be happy at First Street,” said Ryan. “You’ll change the image.” As Michael appeared at her side, he shook Michael’s hand.

Turning to take her leave, Rowan saw that Aaron was at the front gate, talking with Gifford of all people, and Beatrice. Gifford seemed entirely comforted.

Ryan waited, patiently, a silhouette in the front door.

“Not to worry about anything at all,” Aaron was saying to Gifford, in his seductive British accent.

Gifford flung her arms around him suddenly. Graciously he returned her embrace and kissed her hand as he withdrew. Beatrice was only slightly less effusive. Then they both stood back, Gifford white-faced and weary-looking, as Aaron’s black limousine lumbered to the curb.

“Don’t worry about anything, Rowan,” said Beatrice cheerily. “Lunch tomorrow, don’t forget. And this shall be the most beautiful wedding!”

Rowan smiled. “Don’t worry, Bea.”

Rowan and Michael slipped into the long backseat, while Aaron took his favorite place, with his back to the driver. And the car slowly pulled away.

The flood of ice-cold air was a blessing to Rowan. The lingering humidity and the atmosphere of the twilight garden were clinging to her. She closed her eyes for a moment, and took a deep breath.

When she looked up again, she saw that they were on Metairie Road, speeding past the newer cemeteries of the city which looked grim and without romance through the dark tinted glass. The world always looked so ghastly through the tinted windows of a limousine, she thought. The worst shade of darkness imaginable. Suddenly it pierced her nerves.

She turned to Michael, and seeing that awful expression on his face again, she felt impatient. She had only been excited by what she had found out. Her resolves were the same. In fact, she had found the whole experience fascinating.

“Things haven’t changed,” she said. “Sooner or later he’ll come, he’ll wrestle with me for what he wants, and he’ll lose. All we did was get more information about the number and the door, and that’s what we wanted.” Michael didn’t answer her. “But nothing’s changed,” she insisted. “Nothing at all.”

Still Michael didn’t respond.

“Don’t brood on it,” Rowan said sharply. “You can be certain I’ll never bring together any coven of thirteen witches. I have much more important things to do than that. And I didn’t mean to frighten anybody back there. I think I said the wrong thing. I think I used the wrong words.”

“They misunderstand,” said Michael in a half murmur. He was staring at Aaron, who sat impassively watching them both. And she could tell by Michael’s voice that he was extremely upset.

“What do you mean?”

“Nobody has to gather thirteen witches,” said Michael, his blue eyes catching the light of the. passing cars as he looked at her. “That wasn’t the point of the riddle. They misunderstood because they don’t know their own history.”

“What are you talking about?”

She had never seen him so anxious since the day he’d smashed the jars. She knew if she took hold of his wrist, she’d feel his pulse racing again. She hated this. She could see the blood pumping in his face.

“Michael, for Christ’s sake!”

“Rowan, count your ancestors! The thing has waited for thirteen witches, from the time of Suzanne to the present, and you are the thirteenth. Count them. Suzanne, Deborah, and Charlotte; Jeanne Louise, Angélique, and Marie Claudette; followed in Louisiana by Marguerite, Katherine, and Mary Beth. Then come Stella, Antha, Deirdre. And finally you, Rowan! The thirteenth is simply the strongest, Rowan, the one who can be the doorway for this thing to come through. You are the doorway, Rowan. That is why there were twelve crypts, and not thirteen, in the tomb. The thirteenth is the doorway.”

“All right,” she said, straining for patience. She put up her hands in a gentle plea. “And we knew this before, didn’t we? And so the devil predicted it. The devil sees far, as he said to you, he sees the thirteen. But the devil doesn’t see everything. He doesn’t see who I am.”

“No, those weren’t his words,” said Michael. “He said that he sees to the finish! And he also said that I couldn’t stop you, and I couldn’t stop him. His said his patience was like the patience of the Almighty.”

“Michael,” Aaron interrupted. “This being has no obligation to speak the truth to you! Don’t fall into this trap. It plays with words. It’s a liar.”

“I know, Aaron. The devil lies. I know! I heard it from the time I was that high. But God, what is he waiting for? Why are we being allowed to go along day after day, while he bides his time? It’s driving me crazy.”

Rowan reached for his wrist, but as soon as he realized she was feeling his pulse he pulled away. “When I need a doctor, I’ll tell you, OK?”

She was stung, and drew back, turning away from him. She was angry with herself that she couldn’t be patient. She hated it that he was this upset. And she hated herself for being anguished and afraid.

It crossed her mind that every time he responded in this way, he played into the hands of the unseen forces that were striving to control them, that maybe they had picked him for their games because he was so easily controlled. But it would be awful to say such a thing to him. It would insult him and hurt him and she couldn’t stand to see him hurt. She couldn’t stand to see him weakened.

She sat defeated, looking down at her hands resting limp in her lap. And the spirit had said, “I shall be flesh when you are dead.” She could all but hear Michael’s heart pounding. Even though his head was turned away from her, she knew he was feeling dizzy, even sick. When you are dead. Her sixth sense had told her he was sound, strong, as vigorous as a man half his age, but there it was again, the unmistakable symptoms of enormous stress, playing havoc with him.

God, how awful it had turned out, the whole experience. How terribly the secrets of the past had poisoned the whole affair. Not what she wanted, no, the very opposite. Maybe it would have been better if they had said nothing at all. If Gifford had had her way and they had gone on in their airy sunlighted dream, talking of the house and the wedding.

“Michael,” said Aaron in his characteristically calm voice. “He taunts and he lies. What right has he to prophesy? And what purpose could he have other than to try through his lies to make his prophecies come true?”

“Where the hell is he?” demanded Michael. “Aaron, maybe I’m grasping at straws. But that first night when I went to the house, would he have spoken to me if you hadn’t been there? Why did he show himself only to vanish like so much smoke?”

“Michael, I could give you several explanations for every single appearance he has made. But I don’t know that I’m right. The important thing is to maintain a sane course, to realize he’s a trickster.”

“Exactly,” said Rowan.

“God, what kind of a game is it?” whispered Michael. “They give me everything I ever wanted-the woman I love, my home again, the house I dreamed of when I was a little boy. We want to have a child, me and Rowan! What kind of a game is it? He speaks and the others who came to me are silent. God, if only I could lose the feeling that it’s all planned, like Townsend said in your dream, all planned. But who’s planning it?”

“Michael, you’ve got to get a grip on yourself,” Rowan said. “Everything is going beautifully, and we are the ones who made it that way. It has gone beautifully since the day after the old woman died. You know, there are times when I think I’m doing what my mother would have wanted. Does that sound crazy? I think I’m doing what Deirdre dreamed of all those years.”

No answer.

“Michael, didn’t you hear what I said to the others?” she asked. “Don’t you believe in me?”

“Just promise me this, Rowan,” he said. He grabbed her hand and slipped his fingers between hers. “Promise me if you see that thing, you won’t keep it secret. You’ll tell me. You won’t keep it back.”

“God, Michael, you’re acting like a jealous husband.”

“Do you know what that old man said?” Michael asked. “When I helped him to the car?”

“You’re talking about Fielding?”

“Yeah. This is what he said. ‘Be careful, young man.’ What the hell did he mean by that?”

“The hell with him for saying that,” she whispered. She was suddenly in a rage. She pulled her hand free from Michael. “Who the hell does he think he is, the old bastard! How dare he say that to you. He doesn’t come to our wedding. He doesn’t come through the front gate-” She stopped, choking on the words. The anger was too bitter. Her trust in the family had been so total, she’d been just lapping it all up, the love, and now she felt as if Fielding had stabbed her, and she was crying again, goddamn it, and she didn’t have a handkerchief. She felt like … like slapping Michael. But it was that old man she’d like to belt. How dare he?

Michael tried to take her hand again. She pushed him away. For a moment, she was so angry, she couldn’t think at all. And she was furious that she was crying.

“Here, Rowan, please,” Aaron said. He put his handkerchief into her hand.

She was barely able to whisper thank you. She used the handkerchief to cover her eyes.

“I’m sorry, Rowan,” Michael whispered.

“The hell with you too, Michael!” she said. “You’d better stand up to them. You’d better stop spinning like a goddamned top every time another piece of the puzzle falls into place! It wasn’t the Blessed Virgin Mary you saw out there in your visions! It was just them and all their tricks.”

“No, that’s not true.”

He sounded sad and contrite, and really raw. It broke her heart to hear it, but she wouldn’t give in. She was afraid to say what she really thought-Listen, I love you, but did it ever occur to you that your role in this was only to see that I returned, that I remained, and that I have a child to inherit the legacy? This spirit could have staged your drowning, your rescue, the visions, the whole thing. And that was why Arthur Langtry came to you, that was why he warned you to get away before it was too late.

She sat there holding it in, poisoned by it, and hoping it wasn’t true, and afraid.

“Please, don’t go on with this,” Aaron said gently. “The old man was a little bit of a fool, Rowan.” His voice was like soothing music, drawing the tension out of her. “Fielding wanted to feel important. It was a boasting match among the three of them-Randall, Peter, and Fielding. Don’t be harsh with him. He’s simply … too old. Believe me, I know. I’m almost there myself.”

She wiped her nose and looked up at Aaron. He was smiling and she smiled too.

“Are they good people, Aaron? What do you think?” She was deliberately ignoring Michael for the moment.

“Fine people, Rowan. Far better than most, my dear. And they love you. They love you. The old man loves you. You’re the most exciting thing that’s happened to him in the last ten years. They don’t invite him out much, the others. He was basking in the attention. And of course, for all their secrets, they don’t know what you know.”

“You’re right,” she whispered. She felt drained now, and miserable. Emotional outbursts for her were never cathartic. They always left her shaky and unhappy.

“All right,” she said, “I’d ask him to give me away at the wedding, damn it, except I have another very dear friend in mind.” She wiped her eyes again with the folded handkerchief, and blotted her lips. “I’m talking about you, Aaron. I know it’s late notice. But will you walk up the aisle with me?”

“Darling, I’d be honored,” he said. “Nothing would give me greater happiness.” He clasped her hand tightly. “Now, please, please don’t think about that old fool anymore.”

“Thank you, Aaron,” she said. She sat back, and took a deep breath before she turned to Michael. In fact she had been deliberately leaving him out. And suddenly she felt terribly sorry. He looked so dejected and so gentle. She said: “Well, have you calmed down or have you had a heart attack? You’re awfully quiet.”

He laughed under his breath, warming at once. His eyes were so brilliantly blue when he smiled. “You know, when I was a kid,” he said, taking her hand again, “I used to think that having a family ghost would be wonderful! I used to wish I could see a ghost! I used to think, ah, to live in a haunted house, wouldn’t that be great!”

He was his old self again, cheerful and strong, even if he was a little ragged at the edges. She leaned over and pressed her lips against his roughened cheek. “I’m sorry I got angry.”

“I’m sorry, too, honey. I’m really sorry. That old man didn’t mean any harm. He’s just crazy. They all have a little craziness. I guess it’s their Irish blood. I haven’t been around lace curtain Irish very much. I guess they’re as crazy as all the others.”

There was a little smile on Aaron’s lips as he watched them, but they were all shaken now, and tired. And this conversation had sapped their last bit of vigor.

It seemed to Rowan that the gloom was descending again. If only this glass were not so dark.

She slumped back, letting her head rest against the leather, and watched the glum shabby city roll by, the outlying streets of wooden double shotgun cottages with their fretwork and long wooden shutters, and the low sagging stucco buildings that seemed somehow not to belong among the ragged oaks and high weeds. Beautiful, all beautiful. The veneer of her perfect California world had cracked, and she’d been thrown into the real true texture of life at last.

How could she let them both know that it was all going to work, that she knew in the end she would triumph, that no temptation conceivable could lure her away from her love, and her dreams, and her plans?

The thing would come, and the thing would work its charm-like the devil and the old women of the village-and she would be expected to succumb, but she would not, and the power within her, nurtured through twelve witches, would be sufficient to destroy him. Thirteen is bad luck, you devil. And the door is the door to hell.

Ah, yes, that was it exactly, the door was the door to hell.

But only when it was over would Michael believe.

She said no more.

She remembered those roses again in the vase on the hall table. Awful things, and that iris with the dark black shivering mouth. Horrid. And worse than all the rest, the emerald around her neck in the dark, cold and heavy against her naked skin. No, don’t ever tell him about that. Don’t talk anymore about any of it.

He was as brave and good as anyone she’d ever known. But she had to protect him now, because he couldn’t protect her, that was plain. And she realized for the first time-that when things really did start to happen, she’d probably be completely alone in it. But hadn’t that always been inevitable?