Houses of Stone (36 page)

She rushed to the fireplace, seized the bellows, and with the strength of terror fanned the embers to new life. The flames were low and feeble, but they gave sufficient light to illumine the dark figure advancing toward her. She saw the
outstretched hands first, pallid and knotted like roots long underground. The form itself was indistinct, squat, shapeless and dark. With a slow writhing movement a face thrust itself forward, into the light.

Ismene h
a
d known who it must be, but the sight of that withered countenance with its one blind white eye reflecting the firelight in a crimson glare and its features horribly shadowed was so shocking she fell back against the wall with a stifled shriek.

The dreadful face turned in her direction. "Is it she? Is she the one?" a hoarse voice mumbled. Twisted fingers groped through the dark, writhing like white worms.
Ismene
shrank back. "Where is she? She must be warned.
It
must not be. Is she the one?"

Karen had dreamed of that face, luridly lit by flames. The portrait of the old woman and Peggy's morbid commentary must have recalled to her sleeping mind the last scene she had transcribed from the manuscript. It was still unpleasantly clear in her mind as she got dressed and made coffee.

She wished she hadn't agreed to join the expedition to the cemetery. It had been three days since she had been able to work on the manuscript, and she was anxious to find out what was going to happen next. She had finished almost two-thirds of it now, and her familiarity with the conventions of the Gothic novel had inspired several hunches—educated guesses, rather—as to how the book would end. In one sense she hoped she was right, for that would prove how clever she was; in another sense she hoped Ismene would prove cleverer than she, scorning the old Gothic traditions in favor of a more original solution.

It would have to wait a few more hours. She had been too tired the night before to work, and there wasn't time now; she had promised to meet the others at the motel and she was already late. She called Peggy, announced she was on her way, grabbed her purse and the briefcase, and ran out.

Absorbed in literary speculation—was the dark, surly doctor the hero, or were the dark hints about Edmund only red herrings?—she didn't notice the ominous thumping sound until she turned onto the highway and put her foot down on the gas. By the time she reached the motel it
sounded as if there were a rock ricocheting back and forth under the hood.

They were waiting for her: Peggy in her commando outfit; Bill equally businesslike in jeans and denim shirt; and Simon, whose only concession to the rough work ahead had been to leave off his cravat.

Peggy trotted toward the car. "What's wrong with it?" she yelled, over the thunderous knocking.

"I don't know. It just started." Karen turned off the ignition.

"Sounds like a rod," Bill said, sauntering up. "Want to take it to a garage? I'll follow you—"

"Follow her where?" Peggy demanded. "We haven't got time to locate a reliable mechanic. I'll drive. Pull over next to my car, Karen."

"How much is that rod going to set me back?" Karen asked, once they were on their way.

Bill, in the back seat with Simon, replied, "Try not to think about it."

"Damn. All right, I won't think about it." She turned, arm over the seat. "I thought you were going back to Baltimore, Simon. You aren't dressed for this, you know."

"I mean to supervise," Simon said coolly. "And take a few photographs, if you are fortunate enough to find anything worth photographing."

"You brought a camera? Good thinking, Simon."

"It's mine. I brought tools, too." Peggy indicated the shopping bag at Karen's feet. "Clippers, shears, trowels."

Karen's first thought, when she saw the cemetery, was that a power mower and a few scythes would have been more useful. Except for the rusted iron fence that surrounded it and the ruins of the church, she would have taken the place for a meadow or an unmowed pasture. A few monuments reared stained marble heads above the waving grass, but there was no sign of an ordinary tombstone.

Bill was the first to break the pained silence. "We could just set fire to it."

"I'd be tempted, if I thought the damned stuff would burn," Peggy muttered. "Oh, well. Let's get organized."

Rummaging in her bag she produced an aerosol spray can and advanced purposefully on Karen. With a resigned shrug, Karen submitted.

"Is this necessary?" Bill demanded, watching the evil-smelling mist surround Karen. "Surely it's too early for ticks."

"No, it's not," Peggy said. "Hold out your arms."

When she turned to Simon he backed away. "No, thank you."

"You want Lyme disease?"

"No, but—"

"Hold out your arms."

The gate sagged on rusted hinges. One by one they squeezed through. "Disgraceful," Simon murmured. "Even the church has fallen into ruin. They show no respect, these people."

"They probably don't have any money for restoration," Peggy said. "Fan out now. We're looking for the Cartright place. There should be a monument or mausoleum in the center of it, and maybe a low fence around it. Watch out for that, if it's metal you could trip and impale yourself."

The grass was knee-high. Lush and green, sprinkled with the delicate blooms of weeds and wildflowers, it was as pretty as a piece of embroidery, and Karen decided not to think about why it flourished with such extravagance. She stumbled over an unseen obstruction, and felt a supportive arm catch her around the waist.

"Fan out, Bill," she said.

"Then start shuffling" was the amused reply. "It's the only safe way to walk in this terrain; there are fallen tombstones every foot or so."

Shuffling, Karen headed for the nearest of the visible monuments, a tall marble column horribly stained by weather and bird droppings. Whatever object had surmounted it was now gone; the jagged shaft had cracked clean across. The lettering had been deeply incised; she could make out enough of the name to be sure it was not the one she wanted. A face leered up at her from the grass at its foot; dimpled cheeks and the stubs of wings at its shoulders identified it as some variety of angel.

Bill and Peggy had fanned out, Peggy to her right and Bill to her left. True to his promise, Simon was supervising. He had found something to sit on, but she couldn't see what, because it was hidden by the tall grass. He looked uncannily like a Hindu mystic perched cross-legged on empty air, his face as blandly impassive as that of an idol, his fine hands folded loosely on his lap.

It was Bill who found the Cartright monument—a miniature mausoleum shaped of dark stone, square and unadorned except for a simple cavetto cornice. In response to his hail they converged upon him; even Simon climbed down off his tombstone and joined the others.

"As a family, the Cartrights display an admirable consistency of bad taste," Bill remarked, studying the unprepossessing structure. "It's a simple rectangle; hard to go wrong with a form like that, but there's something about the proportions ..."

"Granite," Simon murmured. "Dark as night, hard as adamant. Could one conceive of resurrection from such a habitation?"

"Don't be fanciful," Peggy said. "This is where the fun begins. Take your clippers, ladies and gentlemen."

Karen had to force herself to kneel. The grass enveloped her as it had the stones, pressing in on either side, bending in over her head to form a green canopy.

It took over an hour for them to clear the plot, and all three were hot and perspiring by the time they finished. Studying Peggy's flushed face, shiny with sweat and speckled with green grass clippings, Simon decreed a pause for rest and refreshment. The bottled water was lukewarm, but they gulped it down, leaning against the car and catching their breaths.

"Did we find them all?" Karen asked.

"No." Peggy swabbed at her face with her sleeve. "I don't think so. Some have sunk under the ground. And they, as you might expect, are the oldest ones."

"Hence the trowels," Bill said morosely. "Let's get at it, then."

"Sorry you came?" Undaunted, Peggy grinned at him.

"No." He gave Karen a soulful look.

"I will be recorder," Simon announced, corking the bottle. "Call out to me the inscriptions as you find them. In that way you will not have to carry writing materials with you."

"Glad you came?" Peggy asked.

"I would not have missed it for the world."

His suggestion saved a good deal of time. How long they would have been at it—and how she could possibly have survived the ordeal—without Simon's assistance Karen could not imagine. Not only did he record the inscriptions but he produced a neat plan, with numbers keying the
stones to the inscriptions. The plan also enabled them to see gaps in the placement of the graves; following that lead, Bill dug out two of the missing stones. The inscription on one was so worn it was illegible. The other bore a name Karen recognized; it had been in the genealogy. Poor little Jacob Cartright, born 1796, died 1798; the firstborn son of that generation, he had been given a more elaborate stone than most of the dead infants.

The majority of the remaining tombstones were of a later date than the ones with which they were concerned. One of these caught Karen's attention, and she lingered long enough to clear away the heaped-up earth at its base so she could read the inscription. Eliza Cartright, world traveler and would-be authoress, had lived to a ripe old age even by modern standards. She had been eighty-one when she died in 1912. She had never married; that, Karen realized, was why she was here, in her family plot. A married woman would have lost even that feeble and final independence, joining her husband in death as she had in life. A long poem praised Eliza's virtues and expressed her expectation of immortality. It was so bad Karen suspected Eliza had composed it herself.

As the day went on the sun rose over the trees and shone full upon them. Pollen, dust and bits of grass stuck to the sweat that covered exposed skin to form a conglomerate that looked terrible and itched like fury. Increasingly miserable though she was, Karen did not want to be the first to call for mercy. She was infinitely relieved to hear Simon announce, "We have visitors."

The other vehicle had pulled up behind Peggy's car. "Oh, Lord," Karen exclaimed, "it's a police car. Do you suppose we're breaking some law by being here?"

"Trespassing, probably." Bill didn't sound particularly worried. "Let's go talk to the gentleman. A bold front is the best defense."

One of the officers got out of the car and approached the gate. Apparently he decided not to get his nice neat uniform dirty by squeezing through, for he awaited them there.

"Good morning," Simon began.

"It's afternoon" was the unsmiling reply. "You folks enjoying yourself?"

"We are engaged in serious historical research," Peggy informed him.

The young man's official countenance cracked into a smile. "Right,
lady. You look it. Mr. Hayes notified us you might be coming out here today and asked us to swing by and make sure everything was all right. No problems?"

"None at all," Karen said, relieved. "It was kind of you—"

"What kind of problems did you have in mind?" Bill interrupted.

"The usual. Vagrants, drunks, vandals, kids looking for some quiet place to do drugs and make out." He inspected Bill's tall frame and broad shoulders approvingly, and added, "Mr. Hayes only mentioned the two ladies. Some of these characters can get mean, especially if they're high on something. But there's nothing for you to worry about."

"Thanks anyhow," Bill said, squaring his shoulders and looking manly. Karen smothered a laugh, and he grinned at her.

The officer nodded. "We've had some complaints about a pack of dogs," he said casually. "Not rabid, so far's we know; just wild. They've savaged a couple of calves, but they won't attack people."

"How does he know they won't?" Karen asked, as the police car pulled away.

Simon, a city boy born and bred, looked apprehensive. "I should never have left the safe streets of Baltimore for this dangerous region. Vandals, drug addicts, wild dogs . . . We can't accomplish any more here without equipment heavier than those little trowels. Haven't you learned all you can, Peggy?"

Peggy shrugged. "If you guys are going to strike, I'll have to give in. Actually, you're right, Simon. The person who composed the genealogy must have gotten her information from the gravestones. I haven't found anything new."

"Then . . . then ..." Simon choked. "This was a complete waste of time? All these hours of misery—"

"It was not a waste of time. I had to find out." Flexing her shoulders, she surveyed the sea of green, in which their hard work had made only a small island. In a low voice, as if talking to herself, she said, "I wonder if I've been on the wrong track all along."