Witch Water

CHAPTER TEN

(I)

Fanshawe felt physically aimless when he re-entered the inn, went upstairs, and showered and changed.

Physically but not mentally.

His thoughts had become something like an apparatus of many moving parts, all turning in synchronicity so to process everything Fanshawe had experienced.

A relapse into his voyeuristic obsessions hand in hand with Abbie, his only romantic interest since his marriage; the Wraxall legend; death by ‘barreling’; what were possibly hallucinations of a barking dog and then what he’d witnessed in the wax museum; Karswell’s dead body and its coincidental condition, not to mention that he was investigating Jacob Wraxall just as Fanshawe was; the secret attic room and the discoveries of a more telling diary penned by Wraxall himself, plus multiple containers of witch-water and more looking-glasses; and not only his curious fortune as told by Letitia Rhodes but also yet another 300-year-old diary penned by her linear ancestor Callister Rood…

My aura is black, which means my heart is black, he thought.

No, he didn’t know what any of it mean but he did know that all of these things had seemed to replace all of his previous priorities. I don’t even care about my businesses any more. I only care about…THIS…

The drone followed him back downstairs. When he crossed the atrium, the two joggers, shapely as ever in their perilously tight running gear, cast sideglances at him—and even smiles—as they entered through the automatic doors. Fanshawe nodded stiffly, though, barely noticing them. Where am I going? What am I doing? He felt driven just this moment but didn’t know what toward. Next thing he knew, he was walking into the Squire’s Pub.

“Aw, I’m sorry Mr. Fanshawe,” came Baxter’s crackly voice. He was stocking the bar shelves. “We ain’t open just yet,” but then he cracked a laugh. “Aw, shucks, what am I sayin’? I own the place, so if it’s a drink you’re lookin’ for, what’ll it be?”

For some reason, being addressed directly by another person brought more of his consciousness back to the surface. “Thanks for the offer, Mr. Baxter, but—”

What was he here for?

“—I just stopped by to see Abbie. Is she around?”

“Oh, sure!” Baxter replied with a little too much zeal. “She’s back in the storeroom.” He pointed out the bar entry. “It’s that door next to the check-in desk.”

“I don’t want to bother her if she’s busy working—”

Baxter flapped his hand. “Naw, naw, just you go right on in. And if that pipe-cleaner of a desk clerk gives ya any grief, just you tell him I said you can go in.”

“Thanks, Mr. Baxter.”

The clerk wasn’t even at the desk. Fanshawe opened the door indicated and entered a long corridor stacked high on either side with boxes of various supplies. It was fairly dark. He saw no sign of Abbie but did notice white fluorescent lights burning at the corridor’s end. Though it hadn’t consciously occurred to him before now, Fanshawe knew why he was seeking her: to ask her out on another date. Should he call out her name? No. With my luck she’s already left. He reached the end of the corridor, noticing that it T’d. He stepped into the light, turned left, didn’t see Abbie, then turned right—

Holy sh…

Abbie sat hunched over a metal desk lit by a hooded lamp. She looked intent, keenly focused, yet lost at the same time. With great care, her fingers tweezed a typical key, like a house key. Then, with a meticulous effort, she raised the key to a nostril and quickly sniffed an accumulation of something white off of it. She paused, sitting upright, then stuck the key into a plastic bag full of white powder, and repeated the process.

Fanshawe didn’t say a word. At once he wanted to leave unseen, but it was impossible for him even to move much less retreat out of the area.

After Abbie had done it a third time, she sat back and sighed, staring at the wall before her. She wiped her nose, seemed to grind her back teeth and swallow several times, then she rubbed her eyes. She stared out a moment more, and only then did she very slowly turn her head toward Fanshawe.

Her mouth fell open, then she thunked her head down on the desk. “Of all the shit,” she muttered, already sobbing. “How much more shit is going to happen to me?”

“Abbie, I…,” but Fanshawe could think of nothing to remark.

She kept her hands to her face, and her face still against the desk top. Her words croaked: “What are you doing here?”

“Your father said I could come in. I wanted to see you.”

“Why!” she somehow whispered and shrieked at the same time.

“To ask you out again.”

She sniffled and finally raised her face up. She managed a sardonic laugh. “Bet’cha don’t want to now.”

Before he could decide how to reply, he already had. “Yes. I do.”

At last, she looked right at him. Pink patches splotched her face; tears ran down her cheeks. It didn’t even sound like her when she said, “I’m a drug addict, Stew. I’m a coke-head—a junkie.”

“I never would’ve guessed.”

Another cynical laugh. “Yeah, the Girl Next Door turned middle aged. The Happy Innkeeper. Always a smile! Then—bang! The truth.”

“How long?”

“This time? I don’t know. Six, eight months.”

“So you had a problem in the past,” he interpreted, “got clean, but now you’ve relapsed?”

“Yeah.” She seemed crumpled where she sat now. “Remember when I told you I lived in Nashua for a year?”

“Right, after college.”

She nodded, turning the key over in her fingers. “Well, I guess it’s a universal story. Young, idealistic, adventurous. First time away from home. I met a guy there, fell in love, but then found out that the only thing he really loved was coke. He sold the stuff, too, was a pretty big dealer. He didn’t sell half ounces to college kids, he sold quarter keys to regional bagman. Next thing I know, I’m so hooked, I’m selling it for him.” She faltered as if steeling herself, then looked right at Fanshawe. “And that’s not all I sold for the guy.”

Fanshawe gulped.

“You’re still here?” she asked, acid in her tone.

“What’s it look like?” Grimacing, he picked up the bag of cocaine, knelt, and—

Abbie jumped up. “Don’t you dare!”

“Try stopping me,” he suggested, and emptied the bag into a drain on the floor.

She stood there, slumping. “You son of a bitch. Do you have any idea how much that cost?”

“Yeah, your soul.”

“It’s almost impossible to get around here!”

“Good. I just did you a favor so you can thank me.”

“How about this? Instead of thank you, fuck you.”

Fanshawe chuckled. How did I get myself into THIS? He scuffed his shoe over the drain. “Please don’t cuss, Abbie. It doesn’t work for you. And anyway, I’ve seen men who are analytical geniuses turn into useless waste products because of cocaine. Captains of industry, economic gurus, people who could create fifty thousand new jobs just with one deal, but now? They’re all either dead or useless. I’ll be damned if I’m going to watch that happen to you.”

She kept glaring at the drain.

“I’ll cut my stay short,” he said, “then take you to New York and put you in a rehab, a good one.”

“Oh really?” Her tone seemed to dare him.

“Yeah.”

She sat back down, looking completely defeated. “Fuck. I can’t believe this happened. Couldn’t you at least have fucking knocked?”

“I’m serious about the cussing. It makes you sound trashy.”

Her chuckle bubbled like hot pitch. “You don’t know trashy. You’d be sick to your stomach to know some of the things I did in Nashua.”

“Probably. So don’t talk about it.”

She stood up again, with a sudden expression that was confused and sluttish at the same time. “So you’re gonna put me in a rehab, huh, Stew?”

“Yeah. You sound like you don’t believe it.”

“Why should I? It sounds no different from all the other bullshit men have been telling me my whole life. I’m not naive anymore—I know what this is all about.”

“What do you mean?”

She walked right up to him. “It’s the oldest trick in the book that every stupid woman falls for every time. Oh, yeah. The knight in shining armor, makes the girl think he really cares about her, tells her all the things he’s gonna do for her, how he’s gonna rescue her. And what does she do? She believes it, because she’s made so many mistakes and been fucked over so many times, she’s got nothing else to believe.”

“It’s not bullshit,” he said.

She crossed her arms, talking to him with absolute virulence. “Gimme a break! I’ve seen this so many times, if I don’t know by now I might as we’ll jump off a fucking bridge. In the end the girl finds out it was a crock of shit and all the guy really wanted was a fuckin’ piece of ass. Well, I’ve fucked guys for bullshit before, so I guess I might as well fuck you—”

crack!

Fanshawe slapped her hard across the face.

Abbie flinched backward, a hand to her cheek. She shuddered, half-stooped. “You prick! You asshole! I can’t believe you just did that!”

“Neither can I.” Fanshawe was aghast. He was about to apologize but realized the lameness of that. He wasn’t sorry. “I really do care about you.”

She remained stooped over, rubbing her face. She growled, “I don’t believe that!”

“That’s fine. You will eventually.” This was his mind’s first time-out from this calamity. “Like I said, I’ll cut my stay short. I’ve got a few things to do first, just give me a day or two. Then I’ll take you to New York, put you in a rehab, and we’ll take it from there.”

“Take what from there?”

Fanshawe stalled. It was a good question. “I’m not really sure, but I’m sure of this. You’re not doing drugs anymore.” This was the first time he really looked at her since he’d come in. In spite of her tear-streaks, her facial pinkness, and the overall expression of disdain, Fanshawe felt a soft explosion in his belly. Her body, her gray eyes and indescribable hair, her curves and legs and her bosom—the totality of her sexiness could’ve made him melt. Even after this giant headache…I’m still crazy about her.

She could’ve been a stoic mannequin standing there now. Suddenly her anger turned to dread. “Stew? Please don’t tell my father.”

Of all the comments she could make, this sounded the least explicable. “Why would I tell your father? I just got done telling you I’d—”

“I’m serious, Stew. I’m really confused right now, and pretty damn ashamed. I don’t know if I’m even thinking straight. But if my father found out about me doing coke again…,” then her voice dissolved with the thought.

“You father seems like a pretty understanding guy, Abbie—”

“Oh, he is, he’s a wonderful man, and I’d probably be dead if it weren’t for him. He saved me. He dragged me out of Nashua and brought me back here, took care of me, got me clean. But what you have to understand about my father is…he’s a very structured person.”

“Structured?”

“Yeah. He has certain systems for dealing with things. Let me put it this way: he doesn’t give two second chances. I already got my first one. He forgave me the first time because I’m his daughter and he loves me. It crushed him, it wounded him, suddenly realizing how I’d deceived him. My father won’t allow himself to go through the wringer again, and I can’t say I blame him. His system for dealing with heartbreak is to terminate the source.” Her eyes began to fill with more tears. “That’s what would happen if he found out I was doing coke again. I’d be disowned, Stew. He’d kick me out of this house, write me out of his will, and erase me as if I’d never existed. And I know I’d deserve it.”

“Well, that’s not going to happen. Because you just quit cocaine, and I’m going to make sure you quit for good.”

She looked about to fall apart, teetering forward. “Promise me, Stew. Promise me you won’t tell him.”

“I promise I won’t tell him. Now stop acting like this.” He was getting exasperated, and he knew it was because of this monumental monkey wrench that had just been dropped into his mental machinery. “And don’t blow it yourself. Get yourself cleaned up, and stay out of your father’s way for a while. You’re all lit up like a pinball machine, and if your father sees you like that he’ll have no choice but to think you’re on something. And wipe your nose; you look like you’ve been eating those powdered donuts.”

She kept looking at him, forlorn. “I’m sorry to disappoint you like this.”

“I’m not disappointed,” he half-snapped, “just surprised is all.”

A black chuckle. “Life’s full of surprises. I guess I wear a pretty effective mask.”

“We’ve all got a mask or two, Abbie.”

“Yeah? Do you?”

Her cursed himself for his own placating remark because her question unnerved him. Suddenly the room felt hot as a sauna. “I better go now, I’ll talk to you later.” He turned in the light, then started down the darker corridor.

She rushed up behind him. “Have some guts! Don’t run away, answer the question!”

He bristled, gritting his teeth, then turned back to her. “Yeah, I’ve got a mask, too, Abbie.”

“Then tell me.”

He almost stuttered when he said, “No.”

“Oh, that’s just great! Just like what I was saying before. More bullshit. If you were for real, you’d tell me.”

The cords in Fanshawe’s neck stiffened.

“What’s the matter, Stew?” she taunted. “Am I ruffling your feathers? Huh? Getting you hot under the collar? Why not be even up?”

“Even up?”

“What gives you the right to stand there and make judgments about me, when you won’t even—”

“I’m not making judgments!” he almost yelled.

“Sure you are! You and your rehab. You and your knight in shining armor jive.” She grinned. “Here you are making me feel like shit for the skeletons in my closet, but it sounds to me like you’ve got a few in your own.”

“Maybe I do, but you don’t need to know it.”

She stepped closer. “Just make me squirm, huh? That’s the deal? You can dump my blow down the fucking drain and preach to me about rehab, but the fact is, you got no idea what it’s like.” She inclined herself forward. “You ever been addicted, Stew? You ever get into you something that turned you into a slave?”

“Yes!” he barked.

“Are you kidding me? I can tell an ex-junkie when I see one, and you ain’t it.”

“It’s something else!” he blurted.

“Well then why don’t you tell me? Even the playing field. I told you my secret, it’s only fair you tell me yours.”

He knew she was right, but he just…couldn’t…do it.

“That’s good, that’s a good little billionaire. You’re a cliché, Stew. You’re like these financial assholes in the papers every day, the type of guy who won’t play a fair game. He’ll only play the game that’s fixed.”

He jabbed a finger at her. “Now you’re the one making judgments!”

She shrugged haughtily. “Then convince me. Prove it to me that you’re for real. How can I trust you with my secret if you won’t trust me with yours? All your money doesn’t mean shit if you can’t be real. For fuck’s sake, I just told you I’ve whored myself for my boyfriend in Nashua. Do you have any idea how it made me feel telling you that? Whenever he set up a big dope deal, I was the deal-sealer, Stew. Blow-jobs, gang-bangs—”

“Stop it!”

Her grin rose and fell as she nodded. “One time I fucked a roomful of bagmen to lock up a two-key sling.”

“Stop talking like that!”

“Then have some balls. Make the game fair. Take off your mask.”

The tiniest voice in his head whispered, Don’t be fake, but it was not a tiny rage that made him slam his fist into a storage box. “Shit!” His knuckles throbbed when he reeled back, holding his hand. The box was full of frying pans; he felt instantly inane.

The second he began to talk, the pain disappeared. “I’m what my therapist calls a chronic scoptolagniac—”

“A wwwwwhat?”

He uttered the most dismal laugh of his life. What the hell? What difference does it make? Go ahead and tell her…

So he did.

“I’m a pervert, Abbie, a voyeur. You want to look into my closet? Well there you go. I’m a peeping tom.”

Abbie could only stare, her face screwed up.

“Sounds pathetic, I know. You wouldn’t think someone could be addicted to something like that, but I am, for most of my adult life. I can’t explain it, it just is.”

“I’m-I’m…speechless,” she said.

“So was my wife, so were my lawyers and business partners. Crazy, huh?”

“You mean, like…looking in women’s windows?”

“Yeah. It’s as addictive to me as cocaine is to you. It’s caused by a chemical imbalance in my brain, like the imbalance that causes people to be gambling addicts. And the thrill of peeping stimulates the same kind of endorphin release that drugs stimulate. It’s madness, Abbie, but it’s me.”

Many moments ticked by with Abbie staring dumbfounded at him.

Fanshawe went on, not even hearing what he was saying anymore. “The funny part is…you thought I’d be disappointed with you. How’s that for irony? I’m a pervert and a criminal. I can’t help myself. When I got caught, and after my wife left, I started psychotherapy…and it worked. I didn’t peep for over a year. But then—”

“Relapse,” Abbie said.

He nodded. “It all fell apart, and I don’t know why.”

Her expression finally went from twisted bewilderment to something like mollification. “I feel a lot better now,” she said very quietly.

“I don’t,” Fanshawe snapped. “I feel like scum.”

She sighed dreamily. “I learn something new every day. I never knew people could be addicted to peeping in windows.”

“Well, now you know.”

She laughed. “I’m addicted to coke and you’re addicted to that. We’re both addicts. Of all the things to have in common…”

Fanshawe felt weak in the knees from her comment.

She has more in common with you than you think, Letitia had prophesied.

“I feel idiotic standing here—I’m going to go. If you want to see me again, well…let me know.” He turned abruptly and headed for the door.

“Stew, wait.” Her footsteps rushed behind him. “There’s one thing…”

Fanshawe turned.

crack!

Abbie couldn’t have laid her open palm harder across Fanshawe’s face. His head jerked, and he thudded into a wall of boxes. The pain exploded.

He couldn’t remember what happened immediately after that. His cognizance fizzed away, and his heart tightened in his chest. He heard another thud and felt substance in his hands: something yielding and hot. He was only aware of his rage and the pain.

There was a gagging sound. When he could calculate what he was seeing, Abbie’s face was darkening only inches from his own. She looked horrified but was smiling in spite of it.

“That’s terrific, Stew,” came a mocking croak. “You gonna kill me?”

Fanshawe’s left forearm had slammed her against boxes with such force that the cardboard caved in. His right hand—

His right hand was clamped about her throat, squeezing.

You’re a madman! a thought screamed. Let go of her! but he didn’t. Instead, he gnashed his teeth. “Goddamn! You-you fucking bitch!”

“Don’t cuss, Stew,” she laughed. “It makes you sound trashy.”

“That was twice as hard as I hit you!”

Her hot throat throbbed in the web of his hand when she replied, “Good, ’cos you deserved it…motherfucker.”

Fanshawe felt consciously appalled when he squeezed her throat more precisely while telling himself to release her. Still, her voice ground, “How do you like that? The billionaire shows his bad side…”

“I didn’t know my bad side was this bad. Thanks for bringing it out.”

“It’s good to know I have that effect on men”—she began to squirm in his clench. “Or maybe it just works on perverts who get off on peeping in women’s windows—”

She raised to her tiptoes when he squeezed even harder. “Why are you antagonizing a guy with his hand to your throat?” he growled, glaring.

She kept squirming, the pink of her face darkening. “It’s my defense mechanism, asshole. Don’t you know anything about women who hate themselves?” She grasped his wrist, then edged forward, either in the beginnings of terror or to deliberately press her bosom against his chest.

Fanshawe guessed the latter.

Abbie’s smile remained mocking. “If you’re going to strangle me, at least have the decency to fuck me first…”

Fanshawe released her throat, then dragged her down.

««—»»

When they were done, she lay on the floor as if dropped there, and Fanshawe felt like he’d just been trampled by horses.

“Holy—,” Fanshawe began.

“—shit,” Abbie finished.

It seemed that they’d jammed a frenetic sexual marathon into the space of twenty minutes. Clothes lay everywhere. Fanshawe ached in places he didn’t know he could ache. Sweat-prints on the cement floor left bizarre shapes that trooped the full length of the corridor. When Abbie tried to rise, she winced, then settled for turning over and collecting her garments on hands and knees. “Jesus, Stew. You must be packing a whole lot of angst.”

Fanshawe’s knees were barked raw. His bare heels thudded around as he put on one piece of clothing at a time. What did I just do? “I don’t know what came over me, Abbie. I’m sorry.”

Abbie laughed. “I’m complimenting you, genius. That was the best sex I’ve had since college.”

Fanshawe rushed back into his clothes. “I meant…I didn’t mean to choke you. I’ve never been violent like that before. It was never my intention—”

“Stew, it’s okay.”

His heavy breaths reminded him of his age. He sat back down quickly, then nearly put a shoe on the wrong foot. “We gotta hurry. Your father could walk in any minute.”

She didn’t seem that concerned. “Well, if he does, I can’t wait to hear your explanation.”

“Oh, that’s just great!”

Fanshawe finally got himself together. When he looked over to Abbie, she was buttoning her blouse, forgoing the bra which he’d torn during their heated tryst. Fanshawe stared.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, smiling.

“You’re beautiful…”

Abbie just kept smiling.

“You’ve got every reason to think I’m off the deep end,” he said, “but I meant everything I said earlier, about taking you to New York, and rehab, and all that.”

“I believe you.”

“So you’re game?”

“Yeah. I’m ready when you are, and until then…I’ll do my best.”

Can’t ask for more than that. Fanshawe felt exuberant all at once. He couldn’t stop looking at her.

“But no more hitting each other, okay?” she said in a jesty tone.

“You got a deal.”

“I like it rough, Stew, just not that rough. Christ, for a minute I thought you were going to kill me.”

So did I, he considered in a covert dread. He tried to make a joke of it. “You’re too good-looking to kill.”

“That’s good to know…I think.” A long revelation stilled her. “Wow.”

“What?”

“Sex with you took my mind off coke.”

“Let me know when the effect wears off. I’ll make sure I’m available.”

She chuckled, shaking her head.

“I better go now…” The moment made him antsy. He felt as though he should say something else but didn’t know what it should be.

“All right, I’ll talk to you later,” she said.

He stalked over to her, grabbed her rather roughly, and pulled. Again he was cramming her against the boxes but instead of choking her he was kissing her, while his hands couldn’t resist mauling her contours. I adore this woman, he thought. Their tongues delved; they sucked each other’s breath as if desperate for it. Fanshawe wished he could dissolve into the heat, scents, and substance that was her.

“If you bang me again like you just did,” she panted, “I’ll be in a wheelchair for a week,” but the prospect didn’t seem to daunt her: she reached to unbuckle his belt…

Fanshawe sucked her neck, then dug his fingers hard into her buttocks. She sighed, flinched, then nearly squealed when he twisted her nipples through her blouse. He wanted to do it all again right there, but common sense returned.

He had other things going on besides Abbie. His awareness of the looking-glass in his pocket reminded him.

“Later,” he said. “But I need to show you something tonight.”

“Yeah?” she purred.

“Yeah.”

“Where?”

He looked right into her eyes. “Witches Hill, around eleven-thirty.”

Her eyes lit up, but then she slumped. “Shit. I can’t. Believe it or not, I’m not just an inn keeper with a secret. I’m also on the town council. We’ve got a big meeting tonight at eight. Sometimes those things go till two in the morning. It’s a big pain in the ass but I signed on for it, so…”

“Tomorrow night, then.”

Before she could say “Okay,” Fanshawe kissed her hard one more time, then left.

(II)

Fanshawe showered, changed, and rested, nursing his carnal wounds in his room. I was choking her, he thought. I was…

He didn’t want to think on it further. Not being in control of himself was something he’d never experienced outside of his voyeurism. Images of Abbie and their primitive lovemaking kept flashing in his mind. It had been exquisite.

And now she’d agreed to leave with him, go to New York.

The prospect thrilled him, even in spite of her own much more destructive addictions. But there was something else that thrilled him as well.

He saw that Dr. Tilton had left another message, and so had Artie. They would have to wait. From the sweltering hidden room in the attic, Fanshawe retrieved Jacob Wraxall’s other diary, and spent the rest of the afternoon reading every handwritten line that had remained legible after over three centuries.

It was a demented tableau that unfolded before him. His stomach turned with each sentence he deciphered, yet the more he read the more grimly fascinated he found himself. The nighttime doings of Wraxall, Evanore, and Rood demonstrated an unprecedented exercise in systematic and cold-blooded diabolism, and in real-life atrocities that paled their 21st century counterparts. Murder, rape, and torture were mere commonplaces for these three; instead it was the nauseating intricacies of their occult regimen that placed them on so high a pedestal of evil: infanticide and patricide; the draining of blood and evisceration of live subjects, too often children and newborns; absolutely depressing sexual despoilments; and the alchemical distillation of fetuses, among other even more unspeakable things. Also, the sexual revelries of Evanore and her twelve coven members provided a level of moral abandon that Fanshawe simply could not conceive of. On occasions when certain coven members were thought to have lost a faith dark enough for further inclusion, the punishments they were subjected to were described to every iota that the style and lexicon of the 1600’s could convey, and to an assiduity that at one point forced Fanshawe to rush to his suite’s bathroom and throw up.

This is awful, he thought when he’d finished. And it’s all real. But as disgusted as the revelations left him, the more he regretted how much of the diary remained hopelessly unreadable. He even felt gypped by what he wasn’t able to read, which seemed contradictory, given his open disgust.

At eight, he had dinner at the pub, tended to by Mr. Baxter. He made sure not to bring up the topic of Wraxall this time, so not to seem obsessed. Instead, they talked of things more innocuous, including the weather, and at one point Fanshawe said, “I was thinking of inviting Abbie to go to New York with me for a little while, if that’s all right with you.”

Mr. Baxter had no problem with his daughter going to New York with a billionaire. After more harmless small-talk, Fanshawe thanked the older man and left.

By now, it felt more like instinct that any time Fanshawe meant to stroll the town, he’d wind up on the walking trails which led to Witches Hill. When he arrived at its peak, the sun was setting spectacularly.

Midnight, he told himself. It only works after midnight.

Through his pocket he felt the tubular bulk of the looking-glass…

The temptation was there, of course; there were still two hours to go before the clock struck twelve. As the sky darkened, and the stars blinked brighter, the many windows of the town began to blink as well—right at Fanshawe, baiting him to take out the glass and pursue more of his shame-laden weakness. Even this far off, with his naked eye, he glimpsed the joggers at the end of a run, entering the inn, but Fanshawe did not focus the glass on the window he knew to be theirs. And the Travelodge?

The time couldn’t have been more ripe for a good long “peep,” but Fanshawe didn’t do it. He thought about it, but soon realized he wasn’t going to succumb to the cheapness of his addiction. The delicious thrill he normally experienced did not rear its head.

Instead, he waited for midnight.

He crossed paths with several couples strolling the hill as well. Fanshawe nodded, engaged in some genial chit-chat, then moved on. He paused to view the horrific barrel, then the grave-plots of Wraxall and his daughter, the latter sunken by what had been plundered from it so long ago. Then he turned and found himself standing before the Gazing Ball.

What are you? he asked as if the arcane object were a person. An orangish moon rose behind it, the angle coincidently perfect for the metal sphere to eclipse the lunar body’s glowing circumference. The spectacle lasted only a moment, but in that moment the ball gave off an aura of shimmering, thread-thin light the color of molten lava.

Fanshawe had no choice but to recall the diagnosis of his own aura…

Black…

And the words of Letitia Rhodes: …the color of one’s aura reflects the true character of their heart….

But Fanshawe knew that he was not a black-hearted person.

Before he realized it, his watch read 11:55. Back on the highest peak, he withdrew the looking-glass and raised it to his eye.

Almost time…

The town beamed in the twilight. It looked beautiful…and modern. He ranged the glass around, never once coming near the Travelodge, nor the joggers’ window. Instead he found the clean white town hall. The expansive first-floor windows blazed, showing movement. Fanshawe focused and saw part of a conference table, along with several people sitting behind it. One was Abbie, her hair shining, and her lips moving as she referred to papers spread out before her. Her town council meeting, he thought. Did anyone on the council know about her problem? Fanshawe doubted it. But she’d hidden her drug addiction so well, he had to wonder what else she might be hiding. He knew the trouble he might be getting into but…

I don’t care.

Fanshawe knew he was falling in love with her.

He continued to scan the glass until movement in another window snagged his eye. It was one unit in the row of red-brick Federal Period town-style houses. The movement he detected in the window was composed of sleek bare flesh: a nude woman’s back, presumably, and slick, shining, as though she’d just stepped out of the shower. But the thrill-surge of adrenalin that would typically couple such a sight with Fanshawe’s heart…

Never came.

The nude woman turned for a moment, sporting modest, shapely breasts. It was Letitia Rhodes.

Fanshawe slid the glass away, first out of respect to the woman and, second, he felt no interest in privately spying on her. His weakness for such sights seemed neutered. It seemed like a favorite meal he’d eaten so many times, he’d grown tired of it.

But you will succeed in defeating this weakness, he remembered another of her prophesies at the parlor.

Fanshawe kept his perfunctory reactions in check. Some of the things she’d told him during the reading were quite true but he still knew he might be subconsciously fulfilling the prophesy himself. Time would tell.

And as for time?

His watch-alarm began to beep the arrival of midnight…

Here goes. This is it. Here’s where I prove to myself what I’m pretty sure I already know…

When he put the glass back to his eye, the watch-alarm faded away, to be replaced by the floating, baritone-deep yet uncannily brittle gongs from the church bell that no longer existed.

Now the town sat huddled, as if pushed down by the midnight sky; it was half the size of the town Fanshawe had left just before dusk. Far off, the rolling vista of forest stretched, where there was no forest now. And through the glass the town’s dirt roads lay tinged by moonlight alone, not sodium light from streetlamps.

I knew it, he thought, surprisingly composed. There’s no mistake now. This looking-glass is for real, he thought, which meant—

His own hands now grasped the proof of supernaturalism.

The ramifications didn’t occur to him; no deep thinking accompanied his validation. Those considerations would come later. Instead, he simply looked—and marveled at—the utterly impossible.

The town house that would one day be owned by Letitia Rhodes—and whose taxes would be paid by Fanshawe himself—stood dreary and dark and weather-stained. In the closest pillory, a pitiable woman hung, her waste-blotched hair hanging nearly to the street. A sentinel in a tri-cornered hat, and with a star-shaped badge on his chest, walked rounds down Main Street, a lantern in one hand, a billy club in the other. Several horses stood still as statues while tied to their posts. From the entrance of the church, a man alighted, no doubt the bell-ringer. He walked straight from the church to the tavern across the street.

Fanshawe pulled back the focus, then swept the entire, decrepit town. Tonight, not a single window stood lit—

Wait!

—save for one.

He brought the glass to bear, and closed the focus.

A figure was waving at him, from a top-floor window of the Wraxall house. By now, Fanshawe was not surprised to see that it was the very room he would rent three-hundred-plus years later—clearly a room of indescribable horrors. And just as the room was no surprise, neither was its current occupant, the Van Dyked and emerald-eyed Jacob Wraxall, dressed in a long-tailed vest and ruffled linen shirt; around his neck hung the exact same pendant his likeness wore in the portrait. The cunning grin on the necromancer’s face made Fanshawe realize this:

He’s aware of me. He knows I’m looking…

On past nights, it had indeed seemed as though Wraxall and/or his daughter were personally addressing him through the glass, but this he’d dismissed as paranoia. Now, however, he knew it was nothing of the sort.

He knows I’m here. He’s back in his time, and I’m in mine but…he KNOWS I’m here…

It seemed as though Wraxall had somehow predicted Fanshawe’s use of the glass tonight. Next, Fanshawe remembered the wretched sorcerer’s epitaph: Convict’d of Sorcerie, Deviltrie, & Infernall Prophesie…

Prophesy, Fanshawe thought. Could Wraxall read the future?

It occurred to him that any man who could make such a looking-glass might well be able to read the future and quite a bit else.

Fanshawe adjusted the glass’s focus to the confines of the window. Candlelight wavered from within. Wraxall maintained the sly grin, but the disposition of his eyes changed, signaling to Fanshawe to be attentive…

In the window’s eerily-lit frame, Wraxall raised a hand, showing a scrap of folded paper. His other hand raised an over-sized black book with what looked like gold flake on the cover. Fanshawe thought back to his first intrusion into the hidden attic chamber and the large book kept in a traycase…

Is that the same book?

Wraxall turned the book over in his hand, opened the back cover, then inserted the folded piece of paper. His smile sharpened when he reclosed the book.

Fanshawe kept staring.

Wraxall may actually have even winked back at him. Then he turned and began to climb the rope ladder, taking the book with him.

The now-familiar drone of Fanshawe’s resolve filled his head like engine-noise. He ran full speed to the inn, forewent the elevator to take the stairs two at a time up to his floor, and barged breathless into his room. He locked the door and within minutes had slid off the trapdoor, dropped the ladder, and was up into the attic room that had been known to no one but Fanshawe for over three centuries.

His vigor raised clouds of dust as his feet scuffed over the blood-scribed pentagram. Fanshawe hacked in the floating grit; he was delirious to move on and plow forward. His hand shook when he found the bookcase and then the book itself that had triggered his memory. Here it is! He shined his penlight down. The ancient traycase crinkled when he lifted it open; gold leaf sparkled back at him when he read the volume’s bizarre title: DAEMONOLATREIA. He lifted the entire book out of the case, lay it face down, and opened the back cover. There, pressed between the book’s end pages, lay a dimly yellowed folding of paper…

Parchment, he realized when he touched it, and instantly more of Letitia Rhodes’s words echoed in his mind: Rood’s diary does say that the key to the Two Secrets was written down on parchment by Wraxall himself before he died.

Fanshawe let the invaluable book clunk to the floor, then rushed back down the ladder. He felt giddy when he sat at the complimentary desk and carefully unfolded the parchment. His heart raced.

The short passage commenced: To whosoever by Dark Providence and Adventuring Spirit shalt scruple to follow me: Make thyself sensible to these Words, Venturer, and Rejoyce! Be thy Will stalwart, and provideth thy Heart be Black… To larn ye Two Secrets—yea!—ye Unholiest Knowledge of Extream Evillness of ye sartain Rites of Transmigration and Riches unto like those of Croesus and all ye Pharaohs of Antient Aegypt putt to-gether! These Secrets wilt I make knowne unto thee, but onlie in that they maye be passed from mine Lips to thine Ears—

“Oh, for pity’s sake!” Fanshawe grumbled aloud. “Your lips aren’t gonna tell me anything! You died three hundred years ago!”

But he read on: Thou must now grasp thy Intellect as if ‘tis ye throat of an Unhandsome Harlot, and forge thyself Stoutly Mindfull to my Instructions, which be thus: Taketh thy Black Heart and thy Bleeding Hand forthwith to ye Bridle!

“Finally! The Bridle!” Fanshawe exclaimed, then hoped the volume of his voice hadn’t awakened anyone. But he wasn’t quite sure what to make of the arcane “instructions.” Was Wraxall being subjective? Is there some riddle to this? Or did he just mean…

He looked at his hand. “Black heart and bleeding hand?”

A few more lines of the occultist’s writing remained. Afterwhilst thee must besmear ye Mystickal and Horrid Sphere with thine own Blood and then thee wilt take into thy Mouth one Driblet of ye Wretched and most Nefarious Aqua Wicce—

Fanshawe’s eyes peeled open as he easily translated. Wicce—wiccan: witch! Aqua: water! Witch-Water!

And the rest: Do this, Venturer, and I shalt gladlie receive thee amidst my Parlour and reveal the Secret Inwardness of that which I knowe.

That was all.

Fanshawe darted back into the attic, grabbed one of the flasks of Witch-Water, then drifted back out into the night.

— | — | —