Witch Water

CHAPTER SIX

(I)

In the blaze of noonday sun, Fanshawe looked both ways up and down Main Street, and when satisfied that no one stood within earshot, he sat down on a bench and hunted for the number on his cellphone. Out of the corner of one eye, however, he saw the town church. There was clean white steeple but—

No bell in it, he re-verified.

He’d thought he heard a church bell last night.

Hmm. He let the idea slide by, hoped it would leave his head.

But it didn’t.

Earlier, just after daybreak, he’d slept off and on in his room’s lounge chair, but awoke around ten feeling even less rested. His mind raced.

Then he showered, dressed, and let his daze take him out to the town square. Being in public made him feel safer from his own thoughts—

And his fears of what he might see.

His hand shook holding the phone. “I’d like to speak to Dr. Tilton, please. My name is Stewart Fanshawe; I’m a patient of hers—”

A receptionist told him in crisp monotone that Dr. Tilton was not available.

“I need an emergency phone consultation,” his voice rose, desperate. “You have my credit card number in my file—I’ll pay whatever you want, but, please, get me Dr. Tilton. I need help.”

“One moment, please,” and then music drifted over the line.

Fanshawe waited, hunched over on the bench with his foot tapping. Minutes seemed to tick by; his paranoia made him think they were doing it on purpose. Eventually the line clicked, and Dr. Tilton’s voice came on.

“Hello, Mr. Fanshawe—I’m sorry to keep you waiting. I was tending to a chronic patient in need—a unipolar depressive suffering from delusions of morbidity and suicidal ideations—”

Fanshawe ground his teeth. Was she trying to make him feel guilty for bothering her. I don’t care who you’re tending to—I’m paying more. Before he could speak, she added, “I’m very much hoping that you’ve successfully removed yourself from the—”

“—from the purveying environment, yes, I have. I’m in some out of the way town in New Hampshire, a tourist spot, and-and…”

Her voice sounded dry. “Yes?”

Fanshawe’s nervousness rose up in a sudden wave. “I…had a relapse, I— Shit!”

“That’s astonishing, Mr. Fanshawe, and quite disappointing especially considering how well your out-patient therapy has gone thus far. Don’t tell me you actually purchased a pair of binoculars…”

“No! I didn’t, but then—my God—I found a pair, here. It was in this display—”

“Display? What are you talking about?”

Fanshawe could only release what seemed a string of ordered babble. “This town, it’s…kind of odd. There’s this Colonial theme or something, and a bunch of witchcraft stuff, you know, for tourists like in Salem.”

Somehow the image of the woman’s stern expression slipped through with her words. “Mr. Fanshawe. What does witchcraft have to do with your problem? Not only were you supposed to remove yourself from the purveying environment, you were supposed to banish any implements—such as binoculars—from your proximity.”

A lump appeared in his throat. “I-I found them in this display full of old relics, and-and…I borrowed them…”

“You stole them?”

“I-I—” He winced and ran a hand through his hair. “I—yes, I guess I did, but, I swear, it wasn’t conscious, I don’t remember doing it. I felt like I was in some sort of trance, and next thing I knew it was in my pocket.”

Tilton’s voice sharpened. “It’s called an appositive fugue-state, Mr. Fanshawe, which is a result of undue stress factors as well as other more nebulous things. This led you to drop your conscious guard. Seeking out the implements of purveyance is no better than willingly putting yourself into a purveying environment. We’ve discussed this.”

He looked up, glimpsed some attractive women crossing the street, then grit his teeth. “I know, I know. I just…lost control. I couldn’t help it.”

“That’s a loser’s excuse. Addiction therapy only goes so far. There must come a time when the patient must harness his own free will if he truly wants to reclaim his life. You will return the binoculars immediately—”

“Actually, they’re not binoculars—it’s a looking-glass, like, er, a ship’s glass, I guess you’d call it. One lens, like a miniature telescope. It’s very old, and—”

“Don’t circumvent the subject, Mr. Fanshawe; it won’t lessen my extreme disappointment in any way. The exact nature of your object of purveyance means nothing. You will resist the impulse to solicit your paraphilic symptoms. You must make this effort, Mr. Fanshawe, and you must make it now.”

“I will, I swear.” He felt ludicrous, pathetic. “I just…needed someone to talk to. Christ, it’s not like I can talk to just anyone about-about…this.”

“I should think not. You’ve no one to blame but yourself for this mishap. It’s all up to you. If you fail, there’s only one suitable recourse left: chemical intervention.”

Fanshawe gulped.

“You’ve already been caught once,” the doctor reminded, “and I’m sure that was an experience you’d just as soon not repeat. You’re like a gambling addict, Mr. Fanshawe. Some irregular synapses in your brain have habituated you to whatever thrill it is you get from looking into innocent women’s windows…”

“You would put it that way.”

“At this point, the only thing besides drugs that can potentially correct this synaptic anomaly is the positive reinforcement of learned behavior. You must relearn your mental health by making a concerted commitment via your free will. I’d think it would be rather easy for someone like you.”

Suddenly he felt steaming in angst. “Someone like me? You mean a pervert, I guess, huh? A peeper?”

Tilton laughed, a rarity for her. “Goodness, no! Someone like you: a good man, an attractive man, not to mention a very successful man. Most patients with your problem have nothing going for them, but you? You have everything.”

“Gee, I guess that’s a compliment—”

“Not much of one, Mr. Fanshawe. The best way to relearn your normalcy is to do what normal people do. But if you’re unwilling to pursue this avenue, I think it would be in the best interest of both of us for you to find another therapist.”

“I’m filled to the brim with confidence, doctor.”

“You need to be, otherwise, you’ll probably wind up back in jail, and how much confidence can you expect to have there?” She paused, perhaps deliberately. “Is there anything else, Mr. Fanshawe?”

He cringed where he sat, struggling with a thought. “Well, yes, uh, a question. Do people with my problem—”

“Chronic paraphilia? Scoptolagnia?”

He frowned. “Yeah. Do they ever have…you know, hallucinations?”

“No. Why do you ask?”

Suddenly, no force on earth could make him tell her what he thought he’d seen last night. He was afraid of her reaction. “Well…it’s nothing. I just had a bad dream last night, that’s all.”

“I don’t believe you, Mr. Fanshawe, but that’s neither here nor there. When you’re ready to tell me whatever else it is that’s bothering you, then call my office.” Another pause. “Mr. Fanshawe? Did you hear me?”

“Yes, I’ll…I’ll call.”

“Goodbye, Mr. Fanshawe.”

“Yes. Uh, bye.”

Fanshawe put his cell phone away, his face pulled into a fierce smirk. “Fucking behaviorist. Why do I continue to pay to be insulted by that woman?”

But moments later, as he began to stroll the quiet street, he did feel better. Around one corner, he spotted the Travelodge pool but winced and turned away.

He sputtered. Dr. Tilton had said he was a “good man.” He didn’t feel like a bad one but… Would a “good man” want to look in windows? Would a good man do what I did last night on the hill? Maybe I just think I’m a good man—a defense mechanism—but I’m really a bad man…

His hand drifted to his jacket pocket, and felt that the looking glass was still there. Shit…

Good man or bad, he couldn’t lie to himself. He wished he could flee to the hillocks right now and peep at all those tempting bodies at the pool; and stare, stare, stare into all those windows.

Hunk of shit. Just when he’d started feeling better, here came these waves of contemplations, to bring him right back down again…

And next?

He passed the pillory.

He smiled falsely at a middle-aged couple, waited for them to move along, then bent to inspect the ancient punitory device. There was nothing there, on the wood or the pavement below, to indicate that the device had been sullied or occupied in any way. An elderly man walked by with a cane, perhaps one of the professors. “God, that thing makes me sick to my stomach. They say it’s real, been here hundreds of years. God knows how many men and women were tortured in it.”

Off guard, Fanshawe stood up straight. “Yes. I guess the good old days weren’t that good.”

“Disgusting to think the authorities back then put people in that blasted contraption. It’s evil if you ask me.”

Well, I didn’t. Fanshawe was annoyed. “Yes,” he faltered. “Things must’ve been pretty hard back then, and hard measures were the result,” but he wished the old man would go away. Believe it or not, mister, I saw a woman get raped in this thing just a few hours ago, by men in Colonial clothes. He could imagine the elder’s reaction.

The gentleman uttered a few more gripes, then ticked away on his cane.

An ACLU supporter, I guess. Fanshawe stared back at the pillory, and also recalled all he’d thought he’d seen through the looking-glass. It was all just a bad dream. It HAS to be…

“Eyin’ the ole pillory, are ya, sir?” piped up Mrs. Anstruther’s cockney voice. She’d just turned the corner, on her way to her kiosk.

Damn. “Yes, ma’am. It’s…something, all right.”

“Somethin’, indeed. Would ya fancy a picture?”

“Pardon me?”

“What I mean, sir, is I’d be pleased to take a photo of ya in it.”

Fanshawe’s brow ruffled. “What, the pillory?”

“Oh, yes, sir,” and then she lifted the pillory’s top slat. “Quite a few tourists ’ave their pictures took in it. Makes for good conversation, don’t ya think, sir?”

Fanshawe figured she was angling for a tip—today, he wasn’t in the mood. But it would almost be funny if he did have his picture taken in the archaic device. I could send it to Dr. Tilton. “I don’t think so, Mrs. Anstruther, but thanks for the offer.”

She looked at the pillory as if with fascinated interest. “Perfect punishment these buggers was, sir, for folks who was tarnished, as you might say. Steal a gobbet’a meat from the butcher’s? Well in ya go for a day at least. And ladies caught sellin’ thereselfs”—now she whistled—“well, now, those poor things could get up to a week, and with just bread’n water, sir. And blokes got even more’n that for rabble-rousin’ on a Sunday or cheatin’ on their proper wife or sayin’ untruths to the Sheriff. Late on your land rent? In ya go! Why, they’d put a fella in this here pillory for long as they saw fit, even for takin’ a peek in a bird’s window!”

The last bit of information fogged Fanshawe’s mind.

“Anyways, sir, I must be off to me work, but I hope your day’s a jolly one!” She made to leave, but her frail formed paused. She lowered her voice. “And if you’re in want of exercise today, sir, you might be wise ta stay off’a them trails you’ve grown so fond of amblin’ on. Don’t know if ya’ve ’eard, but”—she leaned over—“there been some dirty-work, I’m afraid. Some poor man was murdered on them trails, he was, just yesterday, sir—a man who was stayin’ in your hotel.”

Karswell, Fanshawe thought. Not just my hotel, but my ROOM. He could have done without the reminder. “Yes, I did hear, ma’am,” he said, avoiding the rest. “What a terrible tragedy.”

“Oh, yes, sir, to be sure. So you’re best to keep your distance”—a thought seemed to perk up her tone—“and if you got your steel up, sir, you know you can anyways have a go at the waxworks,” and then she walked off with a smile.

There she goes again. She seemed to be daring him to investigate the wax museum. Why?

The deadpan stares of the Revolutionary mannequins seemed directed specifically at Fanshawe. A short line of tourists waited at the ticket booth. Maybe it’s pretty good, he considered. It might get my mind off all this bullshit. He got in line, paid for his ticket, then cool darkness invited him to enter a faux-stone hallway with an arched ceiling.

Other patrons with their children appeared to be enthralled by the staged displays of old-time figures: smiling women in sack dresses working spinning-wheels and washboards; motionless toddlers playing with hand-crafted toys; an old crone bent over a hearth oven. One corpulent dummy in tri-cornered hat and buttoned vest displayed a starred badge over his heart. He held a roll of paper, and had a flintlock pistol on his hip. SHERIFF PATTEN read a plaque. The sculptor proved his or her skills by incorporating an all-too-realistic bad complexion on the officer, and a nose like a rotten strawberry. They probably didn’t have Stridex back then, Fanshawe thought and moved to the next stage.

He found the exhibits to be very competent but far less interesting than the slow-moving lines of other patrons seemed to believe. Several varieties of soldiers, clerics, farmers, and wood-workers came next. But Fanshawe’s stiff lack of interest suddenly left him feeling—

Anxious?

Why should he feel like that?

Next, like a carnival horror-house, a short corridor festooned by rubber cobwebs drew him into what could only be—

Ah, the torture chamber…

First, a sign said NO CHILDREN, PLEASE, and all at once—and for some reason he couldn’t guess—Fanshawe’s boredom was transmuted into a dusky thrill. Abbie had said this particular exhibit had given her nightmares; now Fanshawe understood why. The rictus of a slatternly woman in an iron maiden couldn’t have been more realistic, while the expression of the rustic man chained into a chair with a wood fire under the grilled seat made Fanshawe’s innards clench. Several cloaked witches stood in a circle listening to a grim, hooded figure who read from parchment, a pentagram about his neck. Fanshawe felt a chill when he looked closer at the figure’s face and saw that the artisan had blended into the features of a human face some characteristics of a skull. Did the eyes of the witches themselves glow with the faintest traces of scarlet light? Next, a woman in a bustle-dress cringed as inquisitors stretched her on a metal rack; her mouth locked open in a silent scream. A man shackled to a brick wall projected a look of perfect horror as he was approached by a stooped witch-finder bearing an iron rod with its end red-hot. A proverbial shirtless man with considerable muscles grinned as he held a great curve-bladed ax above a headsman’s block; the victim with his neck on the block seemed to have tears in his eyes.

Fanshawe was unnerved by the grueling authenticity of the figures, but what actually stopped him in his tracks was the next presentation: a blond woman hung off a whipping post, her face in absolute turmoil. Her dress-top had been ripped open to reveal her bare back, while the torn material strategically hung to block the sight of her breasts. The voyeur in Fanshawe tempted him to reach over the velvet ropes that bordered the display, to see how detailed her breasts had been rendered, but, of course, he didn’t. Even if he was alone in this section, there might be a security camera; he could picture himself on some World’s Dumbest Criminals show.

Pervert, the thought hissed. When I’m not spying on women in windows, I’m spying of wax dummies. Get a life.

However, the blond victim’s oppressor—a staunch-faced man wearing a buttoned vest and a cross round his neck—stood poised as he lay a cat of nine tails across her back, the lengths of the whip actually frozen in mid-air. Fanshawe blanched at the streaks of bloody scars lain into her flesh.

Good Lord, this is some realistic stuff.

Suddenly he was itching to move on even though the tour of the chamber seemed to be complete. The several patrons who milled about with him seemed visibly shocked by the displays, as if they’d seen enough, but they turned into the next fake-brick-walled corridor. They all stopped at the final exhibit.

There they are, just like Mrs. Anstruther promised…

Two figures that looked very much alive stood arrogantly in a cove made to represent an occultist’s hideout. Ancient books lined several old shelves; a row of skulls adorned the top. An astrological chart hung on one wall, with another chart full of circles and symbols like Hebrew and others that must’ve been Latin. These characters immediately made him think of the strange pedestalled ball off the trails.

Then his gaze locked ahead.

A disturbingly realistic likeness of Jacob Wraxall seemed to contemplate Fanshawe and the others, with green eyes full of amused mockery. He wore black knee stockings, buckled shoes, and a ruffled tailcoat: an aristocrat of the late-1600s. The wax-worker had even hung a similar sickle-moon pendant around the warlock’s neck, and in his hand he held an ancient book.

Fanshawe stared. The Van Dyked patriarch seemed alive enough to lean back and laugh.

“Oh, that’s the guy who built the original inn,” a man remarked to his wife. “How’d you like to pull back the shower curtain tonight and find him standing there?”

“Oh, stop it, Charlie!” his spouse replied, gripping his arm. “Let’s get out of here. The woman is even ghastlier!”

The woman—yes. Evanore.

The likeness of Wraxall’s daughter wore—instead of the fineries of the day—a dark hood and cloak, which would’ve been trite had it not been for the look on the dummy’s face. It was a look of enchanted hatred and hideous knowledge. The more Fanshawe stared back at the replica the more significantly the drone refilled his head, like a faint, inanimate groan. Had his jaw dropped at the three-dimensional image? The waxen mannequin looked so real he thought sure that its flesh would yield if he touched it.

Another couple stepped up; they seemed intrigued. “They look so real!” exclaimed the wife, marveling at Wraxall’s pompous replica, but it was the dummy of Evanore that hijacked her husband’s attention. “Yeah, too real,” he remarked. “They’re people in costumes”—he shot out his hands without warning toward Evanore, to startle the person he presumed was masquerading as her, but the figure did not move or even blink. Aside, his wife frowned; she could see him glancing more than incidentally at the dummy’s thrusting bosom. His brows rose, then he smiled and elbowed this wife, lowering his voice. “Hey, do you think they put nipples on her?”

“Come on!” the wife yelled and dragged him out.

Their exit left Fanshawe alone.

He could’ve been standing on the edge of a cliff as he evaluated the figures. Beneath each, information plaques were mounted, citing data similar to what he’d read on Witches Hill. He felt foolish when he focused his glance on Evanore’s bosom, but the man’s comment had piqued him. I guess he’s a pervert, like me. But it did appear that the life-like dummy had been fashioned with nipples; he thought he could see them jutting against the crude cloak fabric.

Suddenly, Fanshawe’s hand itched. He wanted to reach out, pull the cloak’s V at the neck, and peek down…

For God’s sake, I’m not really going to…

PLEASE DON’T TOUCH THE REPLICAS, the sign blared at him.

But no one was in the chamber with him, and he didn’t hear anyone behind him. What the HELL am I thinking? No cameras could be detected, either. I must be going off the deep end…

Was he really going to touch the mannequin and examine its breast? Was he really going to molest a wax dummy?

But he’d already raised his hand, had already begun to reach out…

No!

He squeezed his eyes closed, ground his teeth, but just as he would propel his hand forward to touch the replica’s breast, he forced himself to freeze. Disgusted, he struggled through the drone, was about to turn and leave but—

Now it was his heart that froze.

His eyes remained closed when he felt a warm hand grasp his wrist. It squeezed.

He heard words then, in a woman’s voice…

“I’m most elated to avail myself to you, sir. I know you espied me last even, with Father’s looking-glass…”

Fanshawe couldn’t move, couldn’t open his eyes.

“Look for me again, any time thou art inclined,” the voice issued on, only now it was edgy with excitement. “After midnight, sir—”

Then a chuckle resounded, the chuckle of an older man, then words like gravel grinding, “Ascend, if thou dost have the heart, and—ay—partake in the bounty that ye hast earned.”

WHAT? Fanshawe thought through the madness.

“—and, sir? Go thither, if thou dost have the heart, to the bridle—”

Fanshawe tore away from the display; the fingers clasping his wrist slipped off. He deliberately kept his eyes closed through the motion and only opened them when he was safely turned away. The bridle? What the HELL? He dashed for the dim corridor that would lead him out. The drone still pounded in his head; he could barely even think the most basic thoughts. He took several long strides toward the exit sign, but it seemed an effort against his will when he stopped, turned around, and then began to walk back…

Don’t do it…

He returned to the exit and found his fingers wrapped around the doorway that led back to the stage. No sounds could be heard from within, no…chuckles, no voices. In grueling slowness then, he inched his face toward the doorway’s edge, paused to moan, and peeked back inside.

The grotesque forms of Jacob and Evanore Wraxall were both smiling now, smiling directly at him.

(II)

What am I SUPPOSED to think? he wondered, sitting crouched at an end table of a fussy café. De La Gardie’s, the place was called. All the outdoor tables were filled—with patrons a bit too chatty for his liking—except for this minuscule table on the end. He didn’t like being so close to the sidewalk, for those strolling by passed right next to him. One woman—a bit too heavy for the body suit she wore—waltzed by with a small poodle; the hyperactive dog yelped repeatedly at Fanshawe. Was it his imagination or did the woman grimace at him? Fat rolls jiggled when she tugged the dog away without a word, her chin up. Take that mutt to the pound where it belongs, he thought, and take yourself with it.

Last night and this morning’s visions haunted him, and now this business at the museum. When he could think again, his head was throbbing. No doubt about it now, I’m having hallucinations.

He could conceive of no other explanation. The cellphone in his hand could’ve been a talisman; he turned it over repeatedly in his palm. Instinct urged him to call Dr. Tilton immediately, but—

His shoulders slumped at the table. What would I tell her, for God’s sake? I was about to feel up a dummy in a fucking wax museum but it grabbed me and started talking?

He put the phone away.

Relearn my normalcy, relearn my normalcy, the words kept circling in his brain. Tilton had seemed assured that this would soon happen…so why hadn’t it? I’m out of control—it’s even worse than in New York…

Why was this happening now, and here?

Because I HAVEN’T relearned my normalcy. He patted his jacket pocket, felt the narrow bulge of the glass. Was the presence of the glass—a symbol of his sickness—the impediment?

How the hell would I know? The six-dollar coffee tasted like nothing, and that’s what he felt like just then: nothing.

Incognizant, he stared at a bric-a-brac shop across the street, but all he saw were thoughts that seemed pathetic. All too often, Tilton’s words kept slipping back as if to mock him. The best way to relearn your normalcy, she’d said, is to do what normal people do.

Was it that simple?

He hoped so, for all he was worth, because if it wasn’t…

Just as he felt like collapsing, lost, beneath the table, a twinge of something like hope sparked in him.

Down the sidewalk, heading his way with a smile that lit her entire face up, was Abbie.

Fanshawe jerked upright, to gaze wide-eyed at her.

“Hi, Stew!” she said. Her enigmatically colored hair shined like exotic spun tinsel. Up on one shoulder she held a rather large box. The sight of her made Fanshawe feel like a famished person just being offered a banquet, and he knew at once it was not lust that goaded the sensation. He was simply thrilled to see her.

He jumped right up to his feet. “Hi, Abbie. Let me take that box for you—”

She stopped at the ornate rail which marked the café’s border. Her eyes beamed with nothing more than a happiness to be alive. “No thanks. It’s just lightbulbs, weighs almost nothing.” She lifted the box with one hand, as proof. “How’s your day been?”

“Fuh”—he stammered at the question he could answer only with a lie. “Fine, fine. Each day, I like this town more. It’s really beautiful.”

A mix of luxurious scents drifted off her curvaceous form. “That’s why I left Nashua after only a year. I know I’ll live here the rest of my life.” Her smile homed in on him. “Who knows? Maybe you’ll decide to do that too. What’s New York got that we haven’t—besides skyscrapers, off-track betting, and multiple millions of people?”

“I’m not arguing with you there.” Just the bit of small talk felt therapeutic to Fanshawe. Her smile, voice, her overall proximity worked as an antidote to the mental turmoil he’d been wracked by only moments ago. Thank God, thank God…

“Have you been to the wax museum yet?” she asked.

“Yuh”—he stammered again, impacted as if by a shout. “Yeah, it was pretty interesting, pretty realistic,” he replied, trying to block out the rest. If you only knew. “Now I’m just kind of moseying around”—he looked right at her. “I want to work up an appetite for our dinner date.”

Abbie sighed in relief. “I was so afraid you’d forget, or something else would come up.”

“I didn’t, and nothing has.”

“Good.” She beamed at him again. “I gotta go now; my father’ll have a conniption if I don’t get back and change these bulbs.”

“See you at seven, Abbie.”

“Not if I see you first,” and then she laughed and glided away with her box.

Yeah, he thought, watching her cross the street. Just before she’d entered the inn, she glanced once sexily over her shoulder.

That’s my cure, all right. My normalcy. A sudden thought made him think of going after her, to ask if there was any more word from the police about Eldred Karswell but then realized the downer topic might darken her day. However, Fanshawe felt rejuvenated. Just the few minutes of talking to her pushed everything back—even as serious as “everything” seemed to be.

He pushed all of his worries to the back of his mind. He couldn’t wait for seven o’clock.

(III)

Abbie looked stunning; he’d even told her that when she’d met him at seven, and in after-thought he hoped it hadn’t sounded fake or corny. She wore a summery lilac dress with strap shoulders. Her bare arms and shoulders glowed healthily; her labors at the inn had left her sleek and well-toned. She also wore high heels—not too high but just right. With every ticking stride to the restaurant, those long coltish legs flexed in more radiant feminine health. Best of all Fanshawe found he wasn’t tempted to stare at her perfect bosom when she wouldn’t notice.

Was some factor of Abbie allowing Fanshawe to relearn his normalcy?

I can only hope…

In the restaurant, he realized it was impossible for him to focus on anything but her. The waitresses and many female patrons were far above average in looks, but Fanshawe barely took notice of them. Instead, Abbie magnetized him as she leaned slightly over the table to talk. Before Fanshawe knew it, dinner was done and nearly an hour and a half had passed. Much of their conversation was comprised of either Abbie talking about her life in Haver-Towne or Fanshawe reminiscing (not very positively) over New York. It felt so comfortable in this situation, so—

Normal, Fanshawe marveled.

Just going to dinner with someone he liked, and talking the way regular people talked. I can’t remember the last time…

Not once throughout the course of their meal had a lustful thought entered his head. Not once had he thought of peeping.

The waitress’s brows fluttered when Fanshawe paid the check with his black American Express Centurion card. Then he was walking on the cheerily lit street with Abbie.

It seemed that whenever he was in her presence, his sense of observation changed. He felt grateful for all that was around him, and intrigued: the glow of the streetlamps, the brick-paved road, the old-time architecture. It’s so different, he thought. So honest.

Abbie grinned at him as they strolled Back Street. “What are you thinking?” she asked. “You seem very…enchanted by something.”

Yeah. You. He hadn’t even realized that he was holding her hand. “I guess I’m thinking about how easily I’ve taken things for granted. You’ve made me realize that.”

She seemed astonished. “Me? How so?”

“Just the way you look at things. It’s like you’re the one who’s enchanted, with everything around you, every minute.”

“Well, that’s how I feel most of the time.” Her smile just seemed more and more radiant. “Every day is a blessing—even if it rains, even if my car insurance goes up or one of the toilets breaks and I gotta fix it.”

“I need a bigger dose of your outlook. I’ve lived in New York most of my life, and it’s taken me till now to realize the cosmopolitan world isn’t an honest world—it’s built on greed, deceit, and one-upmanship—but places like this are honest. When you live in the city long enough you become oblivious to the fact that most of our culture evolved out of small little burgs like Haver-Towne.”

“All towns have their veneers, and we have ours. But it’s really only a tourist town on the outside. Deep down it’s pretty genuine, and so are the people who live here. I never realized that until I’d spent that year in Nashua—and that’s not even a big city, really. I’m so glad I came back.”

I’m glad you did too, otherwise I never would’ve met you. “Like what you were saying yesterday. The witchcraft motif and all that. Take out those corny connotations, and it’s just another reminder of our history.”

Abbie squeezed his hand as if enthused. “Finally! You’ve seemed so interested in that since we met but you hadn’t mentioned it all night. I was afraid to bring it up.”

“What, the witchcraft stuff?” he said innocuously, but then remembered what he thought he’d seen at the pillory this morning. “And Jacob Wraxall?”

“Sure!” Her hair tossed as she strode along. “I’ve been dying to ask. What did you think of the graveyard?”

Fanshawe chuckled but the humor behind it seemed dried out. “It’s a doozy of a graveyard, all right. Why is there a very suspicious hole where Evanore Wraxall’s body should be?”

Was she teasing him? “Oh, I didn’t tell you that part, did I?”

“No, you did not.”

“Are you sure?”

Fanshawe simply scowled at her.

She appeared more enthused now than ever. “Okay, here goes. It was exactly 666 days after her execution”—her long eyelashes fluttered—”when Jacob Wraxall dug Evanore up and ran off with her remains.”

Fanshawe’s pace slowed. “Uh, do I want to know what he did with the body?”

“Well, there was no embalming in those days, Stew. She was nothing but bones by then. Wraxall used the bones for black magic.”

“Warlock dad digs up witch daughter. No Father of the Year Award for him, huh? And what’s with the old barrel on Witches Hill?”

“Weeeeell, do you really want to know?”

By now there was no doubt that she was using the subject to toy with him. Toy with me all you want, he thought. “Yes, I really do. You know, it’s not fair for you to keep stringing me along.”

“They called it barreling,” she said abruptly, slowing down a little herself.

Fanshawe didn’t understand. “Barreling? What—”

“The method of execution, I mean. It was called barreling.”

Fanshawe wondered. They drowned the witches in barrels? “What ever happened to good old hanging, decapitation, and burning at the stake?”

“That was old hat by then. And, remember, witchcraft, sorcery, and heresy were considered the worst crimes in those days. So those convicted got—”

“Barreled… Now I get it. They put the witch in the barrel and fill it with water till she drowns—”

Now Abbie’s refreshing smile turned grim. “Oh, no, Stew, it’s much worse than that. In fact, barreling was about the worst form of capital punishment that the witch-finder counsels ever thought of. Did you see the hole in the front side of the barrel?”

Fanshawe reluctantly nodded.

“They’d put the witch in the barrel, pull her head out through the hole and keep it in place by sliding this thing called a U-collar around her neck.”

Fanshawe made a face, trying to picture what she’d described. “Oh, like a pillory only…with a barrel?”

“Well, sort of. See, after they did that…they’d bring out the dog—”

Fanshawe’s eyes narrowed as if leery of something. How could he not think of those times he’d thought he heard a dog barking, not to mention the dog he thought he’d seen through the looking-glass just before dawn?

He felt the heat of Abbie’s hand in his, hoping he wasn’t sweating. “The…dog?”

Just at that moment, a dog began yelping from across the street. Fanshawe stopped with a jolt, and jerked his gaze.

“Nervous, Stew?” she laughed. “Suddenly you’re on pins and needles.”

He frowned across the street, at the same annoying poodle that had snapped at him this morning. Its overweight master frowned back almost as an accompaniment with the animal’s hostility. That little fucker again… The poodle strained against its lead, barking directly at Fanshawe. God, I hate little yelping dogs. “I like dogs,” he explained. “Just not that dog.” But the distraction snapped. “And what were you saying? Something about barreling…and a dog?”

“Don’t worry, Stew,” Abbie allayed. “The kind of dog I’m talking about was nothing like that little pooch.” Abbie maintained her cheery composure even in the luridness of what she was about to detail. “After they locked the witch’s head so that it was sticking out of the hole in the barrel, they brought in the dog. It was always a big one, like a Doberman, Irish Wolf Hound, like that. But they’d also…” She let out a warning breath. “Are you sure you want to hear this right after dinner?”

“You must think I’m a real light-weight,” he said, yet still baffled by what she was taking so long to describe. “I’m from New York, remember? People—usually stock brokers—jump off of buildings every day. The local crime page in the paper is worse than a slasher movie.”

“All right, you asked for it. They’d starve the dog for several days first, and they’d rile it up, and…well…”

“What?”

She let out another abrupt breath. “The dog would attack and…eat the flesh off the witch’s head.”

Holy shit… Fanshawe nearly stumbled. “Hello! Me? I’ll take hanging any day!”

“Hanging was considered letting them off too easy,” Abbie said. “They had to pay for their crimes against God. Oh, and that’s not some mock barrel up there. It’s the one they really used.”

Fanshawe recalled the details he’d noticed of the barrel, how the clear resin completely covered the old wooden slats: a perfect preservative. But the grotesque verbal portraiture created its own images, which sunk deep into his mind’s eye. They’d sic a starving dog on the witch’s living head… His stomach seemed to turn inside-out. “You know, after all that happy talk, I need a drink. How about I treat you to a Witch-Blood Shooter?”

Abbie’s smile, as always, shined like a bright light. “You’re on.”

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