Household (31 page)

Music. He had heard the music before and now he heard it again, only louder. Coupled with it was low laughter, and what manner of tune could it be? It seemed to be produced by drums and violins. The drums were louder than the violins, a rhythmic beat that made him eager to move in time to it. His body was invaded by the rhythm, and he forgot his confusion and surprise, everything save the need to join in the dance. He was warm and growing warmer; his cravat was too tight, choking him. He ripped it off. His clothes seemed to be weighing his body down. He did not need them. If he were to dance, he must be free of all these restraints. He shrugged off his jacket and fumbled at the fastenings of his trousers, laughing as they slid to the floor. He stepped out of them, unlaced his boots and finally was naked, too.

He looked around him and saw that the group was forming a circle. Something inside of him told him he must stop them, but he did not want to stop them, could not stop them because there was a whisper in his ear, commanding him to obey the prompting of his senses. Someone tugged at his hand, and turning he found Eliza, beautiful in her nakedness, her bronze hair falling to her waist and a look in her green eyes he had never seen before.

“Come and dance, Swithin,” she crooned. “Come and dance, my dearest love.”

But he was not her love. His eyes fell on her breasts, and though he knew he was not her love, he wanted to... He was whirled around and around, and he found that Stephen Hawley was on his other side. He was growing dizzy as he continued to whirl and stamp and hop to the pounding of the drums and the shriek of the violins. It seemed to him that he had danced this way before, only it had been in the fields before a small stone house. He had danced and danced, and then, seizing the woman who danced beside him, he had thrown her to the earth and copulated with her, as had all of them, finding partners and raising the energy they needed to summon winds and sink ships, to raise demons and thwart the godly—to serve Satan!

The imagery fled, and he saw that the circle had broken up and some of the group were embracing. There was Arthur Seymour, his hair wet with sweat and plastered against his head. His calm dignity was gone. He was chanting loudly, each word from his lips an obscenity. Catching Swithin’s eyes upon him, he smiled provocatively and moved nearer but was pulled away by Herman Riner, who kissed him full on his smiling lips. A second later Swithin saw them, still locked in an embrace, sink to the floor. He laughed and moved away from them. His loins throbbed. He wanted his dancer, his golden dancer. Her memory was large in his mind, but Eliza was beside him again, clutching him, her hands slippery with sweat, fastening about his thighs, sliding knowingly around them to caress him. They fell to the floor, and she was golden. He lay atop her, breathing heavily, thrusting himself against her, while she pressed open-mouthed kisses upon his chest. But this was madness! Lucy, Lucy! He pulled away from Eliza. Her frustrated screams followed him, as he stumbled blindly forward and fell. He rose, only to be pulled down by Mrs. Osbourne, who in turn was clutched by Samuel Gillette. She howled with frustration as Swithin wrenched himself away from them and saw that Eliza now lay with Stephen Hawley, who was eagerly finishing the invasion he had begun.

He heard a scream and recognized Lucy’s voice. Staring in that direction, he saw only a mass of writhing bodies. No, there she was, fighting James Mitchell who was endeavoring to mount her.

He flung himself on the man and pulled him away, kicking him savagely in the ribs. Then Lucy was against him, naked, a wanton smile on her lips, caressing him, and in that voice that was not her voice whispering words that both thrilled and titillated him, while he knew somewhere in his befogged mind that it could not be Lucy who was inciting him to caress her in ways that would have been totally foreign to her. The wild music was loud in his ears but no louder than the beating of his heart as he possessed her. Finally, when he raised his eyes from his wife’s beautiful little body, he saw Dolly Tate, fleeing from Origen Hoyt but laughing as he caught her, only to be pulled away from him by Ward Beauchamp, who pinioned her against the wall. At his command, she knelt, open-mouthed to service him. Origen Hoyt threw himself against the minister, who thrust a fist in his eye. Yelling, he stumbled back, while Beauchamp, pulling Dolly Tate down, began to caress her. She laughed loudly as Hoyt stumbled toward Lucy. Swithin knocked him down, only to be attacked by Thornton Brace, who also clawed at Lucy. Mrs. Osbourne suddenly joined them, clutching Brace, who thrust her back with a sharp elbow to her stomach. With a howl, she fell writhing to the floor. Hoyt, recovering, once more grabbed at Lucy. Brace stumbled toward Dolly Tate and tried to kick Beauchamp away, but the agile young minister grabbed at his feet and sent him crashing down, where Mrs. Osbourne, shrieking obscenities, clawed at Brace’s bare chest. In Swithin’s arms, Lucy laughed low and in her throat as James Mitchell tried to pull her away from her husband. Swithin, thrusting at him, was caught and pinioned by Hoyt. He tried to get away, but Hoyt proved to be stronger than he looked. Meanwhile Brace, freed from Mrs. Osbourne, joined Mitchell in capturing a giggling Lucy. Swithin writhed in his captor’s grasp trying to reach her.

“Stop, stop, in the name of God, stop!” Mark stood in the doorway, screaming the forbidden name and wincing with the pain of it. Yet he cried out the command a second time, and Swithin became aware of a diminishing of the music.

“Begone, damned spirits, begone,” Mark intoned. “In the name of God!” He coughed and blood gushed forth from his bleeding mouth.

Hoyt’s arms fell away from Swithin. The music, the laughter, the shrieks of the women stopped.

There was dead silence in the room.

Swithin, shaking, looked around and blinked, not sure that he was seeing aright. Blinking did not help. The room was a shambles. The table was overturned. Amazingly, all the chairs were piled one on top of the other, and as he looked at them, they all came crashing down. The floor was covered with garments tossed helter-skelter, wherever their maddened wearers had tossed them. His gaze did not linger long on the floor, as he looked at the once dignified men and women who had entered this chamber a short time ago. They were a pitiable sight, their eyes wide in shame and horror, their bodies stripped naked, wet with sweat and, in some cases, bruised and bleeding.

Glancing at Eliza, Swithin shuddered as he saw blood running down the insides of her legs. As she met his gaze, she quivered all over, and sinking down, she put her hands around her knees, hugging them against her. Beside her, Stephen Hawley also sank down, his face white, his eyes filled with shame. Arthur Seymour, rolling off of Herman Riner, was also weeping. Looking down, Swithin gasped as he saw Lucy lying naked on the floor. He reached for his jacket to cover her and stopped, remembering that he, too, was naked. Confusion filled him. What had happened? How had it happened? He wished devoutly that he could not remember the madness that had invaded them all—but he could, in every last detail!

Suddenly the room was full of cries, screams and bellows, as those present pawed madly through the piles of discarded clothing, searching for their own garments, ignoring crinolines and pantaloons, climbing into such garments as must cover them easily and hastily. Swithin, kneeling beside Lucy, found her confused and terrified.

“What happened?” she moaned, as he helped her to dress.

“I am not sure, my love.”

He was to repeat that statement many times during the next half-hour as he tried to give a lucid answer to those who accused, babbled and screamed impotent threats at them.

Finally Mark took over, and in a rough, snarling tone that Swithin had never heard for him, he said, “We are sorry for what has happened here, but given your august reputations, we fell that it is best you keep this matter to yourselves.”

“You ought to be... to be...” Words failed Mrs. Osbourne, who was bent over double, clutching her gown about her as if she still felt herself to be the naked cynosure of all eyes.

Other malefic mutterings accompanied her unspoken threat, some erupting into accusations against Lucy, who stood trembling in her husband’s arm.

“If you do not want any of this to leak out, I suggest you hold your tongue, the lot of you,” Mark advised sharply. “We have no control over those we summon at a séance. I imagine this is not the first time such a thing has taken place, nor will it be the last. As experimenters and reseachers into the occult, you know that you are dealing with unknown and inexplicable forces.”

“With demons,” Dolly Tate mumbled, weeping.

“That is not unlikely,” Mark responded. “And I wish to tell you that the medium is no more responsible for them than you or I. It is dangerous to tamper with the unknown, but all of you are aware of that, too.”

“He’s right,” croaked old Gillette. “Let this occurrence remain a secret, a... gentleman’s agreement among us.” After an amazingly brief period of bickering the group, including Stephen Hawley, declared itself in sympathy with Gillette. No one spoke as they gathered their things together and hurried out, going off in as many different directions as there were people.

A moment after the room was cleared, Lucy, who had been very quiet, whispered, “Swithin, I do feel so very strange.” Suddenly, she was a dead weight in his arms. Paling, he carried her up to bed. A shuddering breath escaped him as he saw how white and drained she looked, as if the blood had gone from her body. He did not need Mark to tell him that she had been felled by a great infusion of negative energy, but unfortunately it was nothing he could explain to the hastily summoned physician. There was a moment when he feared she would lose her baby, but against all odds she did not. However the physician left strict orders that she must remain in bed during the next six months.

“Else I’ll not be responsible for either her safety or that of your child,” he finished with a stern look at Swithin, as if he held him personally responsible for what had happened to his wife.

“I understand, sir,” Swithin said in a low voice. But as he sat at Lucy’s bedside, he did not understand at all what had happened or why. It was his wife who eventually enlightened him later that same evening.

“It’s the curse, my love,” she said weakly. “’Twas Erlina Bell, remember?”

He did remember and wondered why he had not remembered at a time when it would have done some good, when he might have awakened Lucy and halted the séance. Was that the curse as well? He did not want to think of the séance or of his own actions and those of that exalted group of scholars and community leaders. Unfortunately it was not that easy to banish the episode from his mind. It had left him full of fears, not only for his wife but for all those who had participated. In common with himself, he was regretfully sure that they remembered what had happened in all its obscene and revolting detail. That in itself was a curse, and was it mere madness to fear that the curse had affected them all? It was equally mad, he realized, to believe in its existence.

Yet he did believe, and he scanned the papers every day during the week following the séance, fearing that Stephen Hawley might have yielded to the promptings of his pen. No word appeared, but he did learn that Arthur Seymour had inexplicably resigned from his post at Patrick Henry High School and at last report was bound for Paris. Herman Riner, that well-known psychologist, had closed his office and was also going aboard—destination unknown. Mrs. Launcelot Osbourne had withdrawn from all her committees, and rumor had it that she had been taken to a sanitarium, suffering from a mild nervous breakdown. Dolly Tate, amazingly enough, was marrying Ward Beauchamp, and they were going to Tahiti as missionaries. Samuel Gillette astonished his colleagues at Harvard by his abrupt retirement, and James Mitchell had announced that he was leaving his lucrative Boston practice for the poorly paid position of doctor in a Pennsylvania mining town. His pronouncement that he owed it to his soul made no sense to anyone save, perhaps, those who had attended the séance. Thornton Brace had also quit Boston for parts unknown. Eliza Bishop, Swithin heard from his mother, was engaged to Stephen Hawley; they would be married immediately.

He heard the news with regret. He could not imagine stately Eliza being wed to the diminutive reporter. However, upon a vision rising in his mind’s eye, he guessed that they could not conclude their nuptials soon enough!

In the next few weeks Swithin realized that if none of the participants had discussed their experiences at what could be termed a history-making séance, there were rumors. These, he guessed, were generated by the servants of those who had attended. Crowds of the curious began to congregate around the house and some people had the temerity to pound on the door and demand to see the medium.

At last, Swithin could bring his bride home. His mother, shut in her rooms, did not protest. She, at least, had not heard the rumors and could not help being excited at the prospect of a grandchild. Mark stayed in the house near the cemetery, tended by Colin and Juliet when the madness was upon him. The Old Lord remained with them. Swithin could not bemoan the loss of his in-laws. In fact, if Lucy had been feeling better, his cup would have been full and running over. As it was, his joy was present but circumscribed. However, he was sure that when the child was born, all would be well.

❖

As Lucy’s time drew near, it was obvious to Colin and Juliet that she was losing strength, even though she was cheerful, happy and full of plans for the time when she would finally be allowed to leave her bed. She blamed her weakness on the pending birth of her child. Fortunately Molly did not disturb her with her wailing. She and Grimalkin much preferred the reassuring vista of the graveyard and stubbornly remained upon the roof of the adjacent house. It was there that Juliet sought them one night, a few days before Lucy’s child was due. She had detected a different note in the banshee’s howl. Flying up as a bat, she startled both Molly and the cat with her hasty transformation.

“Ach, Miss Juliet, ’tis a sad thing to see you,” mourned the banshee.