The House of Memory (Pluto's Snitch Book 2) Page 27

  I had no doubt he was correct. “What else did you find in the safe-deposit box?”

  “It’s Camilla’s family. Maude is—”

  The sound of piano music came from the house. I’d seen an old upright, covered with a heavy dust cloth, in the third-floor ballroom. I’d thought nothing of it until now. And in that moment, I realized that Camilla was missing. Dr. Abbott and the priest were talking, and she’d slipped away without anyone noticing.

  I staggered back from David. “She’s in there. We have to get to her. Now.”

  As he turned, stunned, Chopin’s nocturnes came from the third floor, the fading day calling to the coming night, as if the house knew my thoughts and emotions.

  Suddenly two windows on the third floor blew out, glass shattering and flying toward us as we ducked behind the cars some fifty yards away.

  “She’s in there by herself!” David turned toward the house.

  “David, wait.” I tried to grasp his coat, but he was already running toward the house. The thing I’d tried hard to avoid was happening. David and Camilla would be in the house alone.

  “Wait! What’s wrong with David?” Camilla stepped out from behind one of the cars. “We have to stop him.”

  I realized then that the house had tricked us. It had cut David from the herd, and I feared what it meant to do with him.

  “Who’s playing the piano?” Zelda asked.

  I felt half-shocked to know that someone else could hear it, but there was no time to speculate. “Come with me.” I strode toward the house, followed by Camilla, Zelda, Dr. Abbott, and Father Gregory, who didn’t look happy to be part of the night’s proceedings. Nonetheless, he might prove more valuable than anyone else attending. Madam’s reading of the situation at Roswell House was that the entity came from the past. Without being on the premises, she couldn’t be more specific, but she’d given me a series of questions to ask and rituals to perform. If Wick Roswell or Nina Campbell had killed with such viciousness that they’d warped the spirits of their victims, I would try to release them. If it was Wick or Nina in residence, then I intended to cast them out. And I might need Father Gregory to help me do that. But for now, we had to get to David.

  I was surprised when we entered the house without problems. The piano music had stopped, and David sat on the stairs, a bit stunned but unharmed. The house, or the specter occupying it, had shown us the power it wielded. Now it was playing possum.

  Camilla gave David some water as Zelda and I lit the candles, preparing the dining table for the séance. We had everything in order as the summer sun began to sink below the tops of the trees. A July storm had swiftly moved in, and lightning forked across the western sky, followed by thunder. My mother had told me to count the seconds between lightning and thunder, and it would tell me the distance of the storm from my location. Six miles. It would be upon us in a matter of minutes, and soon it would be full dark.

  Roswell House was silent as we made our preparations, but I knew better than to trust it. It was waiting. She was in here. I’d seen her in the window, heard her fingers on the piano keys. She was a trickster, and she’d shown me how she could manipulate each of us. What if I lost control of the séance?

  I thought of the kitchen knives, and I hurried there to make sure they had not been returned. They were still securely locked away, and the key remained in the pocket of my skirt. I gave it to Dr. Abbott without explanation, only asking him to hold on to it.

  I desperately wanted Reginald to be here. In our short partnership, I’d come to rely on him to know when to intervene. I feared I might lose myself. Or that, if the entity overpowered me, I might try to harm Camilla or David. I kept those worries mostly to myself, telling David in a whisper that if I became aggressive, to render me unconscious with a tranquilizer or whatever it took. He understood my meaning.

  Zelda went to the door and shut it as the sun dipped behind the treetops. There was still plenty of light, but it was the dying light of dusk, soon to be gone. Day yielding to night . . . I pushed those thoughts away. There was business to be done.

  “Once we’re seated, please don’t get up. If I go into a trance, ask the questions you need to know, which is who fills this space and what does she or it want. I’ve written them down.” I pushed the notes I’d made toward David. “Try to find out who’s here.”

  “She?” the priest asked.

  “I believe the entity is female, though I can’t be certain. Some spirits, if this is a spirit, assume whatever form they need for trickery. If she attempts to take me over, please try to stop her.”

  My voice shook, and I couldn’t help it.

  The priest stood up. “I don’t think I can be a part of this attempt to communicate with evil.”

  “Father,” David said softly, “will you stay outside? In case we need you.”

  His request was so soft-spoken, so filled with desperation, that the priest nodded as he left the house. “I’ll wait at the car.”

  No one else heard it at all, but I could have sworn the house giggled. I looked around, steeling myself for what was to come. “Join hands on top of the table.”

  I went through the ritual Madam recommended, purging the house of all spirits, of the past, of negativity. Zelda used sage smoke to cleanse the house, blowing the aromatic smoke from a smoldering bundle of leaves, into the corners of the first floor. She started toward the upstairs, and a burning ember dropped into the short skirt of her dress. In a moment, she was batting out flames.

  It happened so quickly, I barely had time to stand up. David jumped up from his seat, threw his coat over Zelda, and smothered the fire before she was truly harmed, but it unnerved everyone at the table. Everyone except Zelda, who was spitting mad. “I loved this dress.” She held out the charred skirt, which stank of smoke and fire. “You can’t scare me away,” she said to the house. “We will defeat you.”

  I wished yet again for her courage.

  “Are you sure we should continue?” Camilla had sat silently at the table, but when I looked at her, truly looked, I could see she was in emotional distress.

  “We must,” Zelda said. “If this is to be ended, we must do it now.” Lightning sizzled outside, and a clap of thunder so loud it made us all jump emphasized her determination.

  I couldn’t disagree, and we returned to the table, Zelda now seated beside Camilla. We joined hands. Before I could utter a word, the candles in the room were extinguished with a rancid gust of wind. Camilla gasped, and David urged her softly to remain calm.

  “What is this?” Dr. Abbott demanded. “Some trick?”

  “Be steady,” David said. “Let Raissa work.”

  Without warning, she was with us. She stood not ten feet from the table. I saw her in the flash of lightning that illuminated her. And then I heard the buzzing of the flies. The rot of decay wafted over the table, and everyone began to gag. If Dr. Abbott had doubted me, he no longer did.

  “What in the hell?” he muttered.

  “Who are you?” I asked the creature.

  She didn’t speak, but I heard her answer. The past is always alive.

  It was the best clue she’d given. “What do you want?”

  Camilla gasped and struggled for breath. “It’s pushing at me, trying to push into my chest again. Don’t let it.”

  I now believed that whatever was pushing at Camilla was somehow part of her. Camilla had to be a Roswell.

  Before I could pursue the matter, lightning struck in the front yard. Ozone filled the air, and I had a terrified thought for the priest. Had he been struck? Before I could even stand, the front door flew open.

  Jason Kuddle entered the house, a gun in his hand. “Leaving a priest for a guard isn’t so smart.” He looked around. “Well, isn’t this cozy?” He pointed with his pistol barrel. “Get up and move over to the wall. All of you.” David, Dr. Abbott, Camilla, and I responded.

  Zelda didn’t move. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

  “What’s ne
cessary. Now move.” He grasped her shoulder and dragged her up from her chair, thrusting her against the wall with the rest of us. “You couldn’t let it go,” he said. “You kept poking and poking and poking. You sent the law out to Bryce, and they found those two little bitches. I should’ve killed them.”

  “Joanne is safe?” Camilla asked.

  “So what if she is? You won’t see her again.”

  “And the Ames girl?” I asked. My question was sincere, but I also hoped to distract him. If we wanted to live, one of us was going to have to make a move. He’d left the front door open, and outside lightning exploded once again as the rain came down in a solid sheet.

  “The cops took her. They won’t get nothin’ out of her, though.”

  I thought of Mrs. Ames, broken by her daughter’s abduction, and I wanted to kill Kuddle. Zelda’s hand caught mine, and she squeezed.

  “Where’s Reginald? He left with you. What did you do to him?” I had to know what happened to my partner.

  “He ain’t the pretty boy he used to be.”

  I pulled away from Zelda, fists clenched, but she pulled me back. She wasn’t as tall as I was, but she was strong. “Stop,” she whispered in my ear. “He’ll kill you.”

  “He’s going to kill us all. Don’t you see? He’s been a part of these abductions all along. He and Dr. Perkins are working together. They take these young girls, destroy their wills with that horrific surgery, and turn them out as prostitutes.” There wasn’t any point in pretending I hadn’t figured it out. This was the connection to Camilla and the lost girls, to Bryce and the fate of rural young women whose families had no money to search for them. My efforts to help Camilla had led me to the lost girls. Had Zelda not hired Reginald and me to help Camilla, we would never have known what was happening.

  “You’re not as smart as you think,” Kuddle said, but his cocky attitude had clearly taken a hit.

  The storm crashed around the house, and the wind outside roared. A limb blew into the window behind us, and we all jumped. When I looked at the open door where the rain and shredded leaves blew into the house, I saw a sodden figure standing in the doorway. Soon it was joined by another. The house contained more than one spirit, and they came toward us. One held something in his hand. As they drew closer, I realized it was a tire tool.

  No, not a spirit. Father Gregory had entered the house with a weapon.

  He closed in on Kuddle, who remained unaware of his arrival. Father Gregory raised the tire iron and brought it down with enough force to drop Kuddle to his knees. The second man kicked him in the chest, sending him toppling to the floor. The gun skittered across the floor, and, in a split second, David had it in his hand.

  “Reginald!” David said. “Thank God! You’re alive!”

  “Not because that bastard didn’t try to kill me.” It was indeed my partner, looking more like a miserable, drowned rat than my debonair friend. I ran to him and hugged him tightly. It was only when I stepped back and Zelda lit a candle that I realized Reginald was not just wet—he was bleeding. Blood soaked his clothes and the side of his head, face, and neck. He staggered but managed to stay on his feet, then toppled to the floor, unconscious.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  The room was ablaze with candles. Jason Kuddle, still unconscious, lay on the floor by the wall, tied with cords from the heavy draperies. He wasn’t going anywhere. Dr. Abbott expressed concern that he might have sustained a concussion, but Kuddle was at the bottom of my priority list.

  Prior to examining Kuddle, Dr. Abbott had patched the gunshot wound in Reginald’s shoulder and dressed his head wound, and we’d managed to seat him at the table. Reginald would require surgery to remove the bullet that Kuddle had put into him—leaving him to bleed out in the woods behind the bar where I’d met Martha. I’d been a hundred yards from Reginald and hadn’t a clue he lay bleeding in the dirt. Martha had lied to me. She and Kuddle were in league together.

  I sat in front of Reginald and put a hand to his forehead. At least the bleeding had stopped, and he was conscious and determined to finish our night’s business. Even in his weakened state, he’d prevailed upon the priest to wield a tire iron and strike a man—a murdering criminal to be sure—because Reginald was too weak to hit him properly. Father Gregory had chosen wisely and saved all of us.

  “I know the link between Camilla and Roswell House,” Reginald said. We all drew close to listen to him. “I know why Camilla is being targeted.”

  “Tell us quickly.” The temperature in the house shifted, and a chill swept over me. Camilla felt it, too, and rubbed her arms briskly, unaware what the wave of cold might signal. “Hurry, Reginald. Talk fast.” We still had unfinished business in Roswell House. The storm had passed, but the hour was creeping toward midnight, and I had a sense that the house waited for that time between—the veil between the dead and the living was always thinnest in those hours or days where change, from day to night or season to season, occurred.

  “Camilla is a descendant of Nina Campbell, Maybel Cooner’s illegitimate child. Maude was Nina Campbell’s child, though she’s worked hard to hide it.”

  David stood abruptly. “That’s what Maude didn’t want me to find out. That’s why she had me arrested. The letters in the safe-deposit box mentioned Buster’s Bar. I went there, and that woman, Martha, told me Maude had terrible secrets that impacted Camilla, and if I wanted the truth, I should wring it out of her. So I went there, and she called the police on me.”

  “Wait,” I said. “Nina and Wick Roswell had a child?”

  “I can’t say if Wick was the father, but Nina is definitely Camilla’s grandmother.” Reginald swallowed, and I handed him a glass of water.

  “That can’t be.” Camilla stepped back as if she’d been struck. “Nina Campbell was a wicked woman. Cruel and malicious. I’ve heard stories about her all my life, how she ruined people’s lives and committed robberies and shootings. I can’t be related to her. She can’t be my grandmother.”

  “But she is,” Reginald said. His voice was weak, but his convictions made him sit up straighter. “You are her heir, and the presence in this house is between you and Nina. Before Kuddle shot me, Martha Campbell told me the truth. She’s your aunt, Camilla. Martha and Maude are sisters, though Maude has done everything in her power to hide that secret, even to the point of moving away as a very young girl, changing her name, and coming back. She’s been paying Martha a stipend to keep her secret.”

  “The past is always alive.” I repeated what I’d heard earlier, what the entity had told me.

  “What does that mean?” Camilla asked. “I don’t understand.”

  I wasn’t certain I did either, but I had an inkling. “Do you believe that people return, that their spirits can reincarnate?”

  “That’s absolute foolishness,” Father Gregory said. His impatience had been visibly growing. “You die and you ascend to heaven, or you’re sentenced to hell or the limbo of purgatory. There is no coming back to live again.”

  I didn’t want to dispute the man who’d saved our lives, but I had to. “I’m not an expert on religion, but what if a soul wanted to make amends, to come back as a good person instead of someone cruel and vile?”

  “You think Camilla is confronting her past life as Nina Campbell.” Reginald, even in his weakened state, understood. “She’s reincarnated to make amends, but the past life never truly let go.”

  “No! No! That can’t be.” Camilla started toward the door, but David caught her.

  “Think about it, Camilla,” Reginald said. “Wick Roswell used Nina. Because Kuddle was going to kill me, Martha told me the whole story, how Wick promised Nina the moon. How he used her to do his dirtiest work. Together they murdered innocent children, took what they wanted, cheated, robbed, and intimidated. And then he abandoned Nina and married the society girl. He made Priscilla Harlow the lady of this house, the house Nina thought he was building for her.”

  It made perfect sense in a terrible way. “And
this is the curse on the females of the Roswell line. Nina knew the surest way to mark the family.” I put a hand on Camilla’s shoulder. “You’re here to balance the scales, Camilla. Your character, your compassion—these are things that offset the past. Where we come from doesn’t dictate who we are.”

  “The problem is Nina has left a very strong remnant here, a past life. And she isn’t ready to reform,” Reginald added. “She wants her due. Roswell House. And she intends to take it, using you.”

  “This is nonsense.” Father Gregory headed to the door. “I can’t be part of this.”

  “I understand,” I said. “But you saved us all from Jason Kuddle. We truly don’t mean to offend you, and we thank you.”

  “I’ll wait in the car.”

  When he was gone, I turned to Dr. Abbott. “If you’d like to leave, we understand.”

  “You think I’m leaving now? Not on a bet.”

  I motioned the others to give me a moment alone with Reginald. He was wan, but he would make it through the ritual. “What if we’re wrong?” I asked.

  “I’m not certain about the past life, but there is residual energy here. There’s something from the past that is filled with darkness and cruelty. The priest might call it evil, but I don’t know. I only understand that it’s part of Camilla. Perhaps a part she left behind when she was Nina, or maybe a part she needs now to become her own woman.” He touched my cheek softly. “Her own person. I believe that sometimes bits of us get scattered, and Nina Campbell was so terribly strong, all those cruel things were left behind.”

  “Maude is pretty awful, too. The apple didn’t fall far from the tree.”

  Reginald snorted. “Truer words and all that. The problem is, Camilla disavows those aspects of who she is. I’m not certain she can accept them.”

  “If she doesn’t?”

  “They’ll remain here, in the house.”

  “And if she does concede they are a necessary part of her, will it change her?”

  “I can’t honestly answer that. I’ve seen Madam integrate a past life once. The gentleman survived and went home, but who can say how it truly turned out? We never heard from him again.”