A Cast-Off Coven (10 page)

And in that mirror . . . a face?

The ghostly visage was gone so fast that one might convince one’s rational mind that it was a trick of the light. But this wisp of a spirit was accompanied by an undeniable tingle of energy and a blast of icy air. It was trying to make contact. Whether that was helpful or threatening, I had no way of knowing.

Right about now I was wishing I had some of that RadioShack equipment, not to mention a psychic ghostbuster at my side—a burly, muscle-bound psychic ghostbuster. I’m not frightened of spirits per se, but there was something wrong in this room.

Crouching down, I kept my eyes on the mirror while reaching into my satchel and extracting a megawatt flashlight.

“Were you a Girl Scout, by any chance?”

Luc’s voice startled me. I had forgotten about him. My witchcraft training had taught me first and foremost to focus my intent to the exclusion of all else, a skill I had mastered early on. This otherwise admirable power of concentration got me into trouble at times like these.

“Not hardly,” I said as I stood and gently shoved him out of the room. “Stay in the hall, please.”

Luc smiled but looked curious. “Want to keep the treasure to yourself? I won’t steal it.”

“Just stay outside until I say so.”

Turning back to the room, I knelt before a large black trunk covered in tooled leather, bearing still-colorful stamps from France and Hungary. I slowly undid the brass latches that held it closed, took a deep breath, and inched it open, praying it didn’t contain a skeleton or something equally macabre.

It stuck at first, then opened with a poof of dust. I peeked inside.

Ruffles, lace, Victorian- era underthings. Frilly cotton petticoats and silk camisoles. I breathed a sigh of relief.

Clothes were my strong suit. Finally, something I could read.

The clothes smelled of aromatic cedar. A cursory inspection revealed some light stains, but nothing I couldn’t handle, and the fabric was in great shape. One by one I picked the pieces up and held them to my chest, feeling for their vibrations. There was some darkness, yes, but an overarching feeling of excitement and purpose. The particulars weren’t easy to understand—the sensations were frustrating and elusive; very old and vague.

I held a corset up to myself. It was made of delicate ivory silk and ice blue satin ribbons. Looking in the full-length mirror, I felt a strong, outlandish impulse to strip, right then and there, and don the garment.

“I’m trying not to get hot here.”

I whirled around.

Luc was right behind me.
Why does no one do what I ask?

“I
told
you to stay outside.”

Luc gestured to the corset I was clutching to my chest. “Now
that’s
fodder for any number of adolescent fantasies. Fortunately, I am urbane and sophisticated.”

I tossed the undergarment into the chest. Grabbing my satchel, I rooted around for one of the extra protective amulets I always carry with me.

“At least wear this,” I said as I stood and hung the pendant around his neck. I laid my hands flat on his chest and murmured a brief protective incantation. “Don’t touch anything. And don’t look in the mirror.”

“Oookaaaay.” He picked the carved medallion up off his chest to study it, then cast an interested look back at me, raising one eyebrow. “What’s this?”

“It’s a . . . um . . . good luck charm.”

Luc gave me a slow, curious smile. “Kind of creepy in here, isn’t it?”

I nodded, looking up at him. Our gaze held a beat too long. I was finding it a little hard to breathe.

“And what’s in the mirror?” he asked, looking over at it. I grabbed one of the petticoats from the trunk and used it to cover the looking glass. It was one thing for a powerful witch to shrug off visions in a haunted mirror; quite another for a normal human to do so.

Suddenly, the closet door slammed shut. There were heavy footsteps out in the hallway and loud, unnatural breathing, growing in intensity.

And the loud squeal of a pig, with the clatter of small hooves rushing toward us down the hallway.

“Oscar!” I yelled, flinging the door open, but it slammed shut before I could take a step. I opened it again, and it banged closed. I tried it once more.

“I think it wants to stay shut,” said Luc, his voice loud enough to be heard over the moaning that began to swirl around us.

Luc pushed me aside and opened the door easily enough, then threw a chair into the opening before it slammed shut once again. With remarkable athletic prowess, Oscar sailed over the chair into the room, accidentally kicking the chair into the hallway, and the door slammed shut again.

“What the—”

Luc bent over to peer through the hole in the door. I grabbed him by the shoulders and yanked him back just as a burst of light and burning hot air blew through the open keyhole.

The breathy moaning swirled about us, echoing off the angled walls, so intense it was painful. I clutched my medicine bag and wrapped Luc’s hand around it as well, my other hand caressing the top of Oscar’s head. Luc twined his arm around me and held me tight, whether to protect me or to comfort himself, I wasn’t sure. Either way I was grateful: In the supernatural pandemonium, the vibrations and breath of another human being were a lifeline, tethering us to this plane of existence. Oscar, Luc, and I backed away from the door to the far corner of the room behind the steamer trunk, where we sank to the floor. Oscar jumped into my lap, shaking. We covered our ears and huddled together against the wall as the ashes on the floor swirled up in the whirlwind, careening through the small space.

The chaos showed no signs of abating. This was ridiculous.

I lifted Oscar into Luc’s lap, grabbed my backpack, and extracted a jar of salts. Casting a circle around us, I drew symbols of protection with the salts and chanted.

At first I had to shout to be heard. I closed my eyes and called on my guiding spirit as I cast. I repeated the chant over and over, working myself into a near trance as the sounds subsided, becoming fainter until things fell silent.

Just as suddenly as it had arrived, it was gone. “You okay?” Luc asked.

I nodded. “You?”

“I’m fine. That . . .” He trailed off and shook his head.

“That was the damnedest thing. Are you a priestess of some sort?”

“Not exactly,” I said. I noticed that Luc seemed more intrigued than frightened. I didn’t know whether to be relieved by his relatively calm reaction . . . or suspicious.

Oscar started running around the room in circles like a mad pig.

Luc chuckled. “He needs a piggy sedative.”

“Don’t we all.”

I tried the door, which swung open easily—and stayed open. Luc and I peered up and down the hallway. Nothing. Within our cramped closet, all was back to normal, including the neat little piles of ashes.

The immediate danger having passed, I wanted to look around the closet some more. Luc seemed to be on the same wavelength. Evening had fallen. There was no more sun through the grate, and the light cast from the hallway was dim. My flashlight had given up the ghost when I dropped it.

A Bic lighter sat on the bureau next to the candelabra, left over, I imagined, from when Marlene and Ginny opened the closet; no doubt they had no light, either.

As I was looking down the hall, Luc lit the candles.

“Wait!”

“What?”

Too late. He had already lit them. I held my breath and listened. Candles set out in a certain configuration could be a sign of a spell, and if they were lit in a particular way, the spell could be activated.

Or they could simply be used for light in a room without a lamp.

“Nothing,” I said when all seemed normal. “Never mind.”

“Take a look at this,” said Luc. He held some papers near the candle. “A letter. Do you read French?”

I shook my head. “Just Spanish.”

“
We don’t know how long you can expect to stay, but our lord will be with you for eternity
,” he translated out loud. He looked at the envelope, then rummaged through the box some more. “From France. Looks like the only one. What do you suppose all this is? Why would they have kept it all in here for all these years?”

“I have no idea.” Was it deliberately hidden in here, or had it simply been forgotten? I started looking through the clothes hanging in the armoire—a few simple skirts and blouses, more underthings.

I noted a floral scent, like perfume.

And music.

Annoyed, I said to Luc, “I told you not to touch anything.”

“I didn’t.” Luc gestured toward a music box sitting atop the bureau. “It started on its own.”

It was a simple wooden box; when it was opened, a glass plate allowed you to see the movement of the metal drum and comb. It was twirling around slowly, playing a ditty at once familiar yet foreign sounding.

Luc started singing, “ ‘There’s a place in France where the naked ladies dance . . .’ ”

“That’s how the song goes?”

“You don’t know that one? It was all the rage in the third grade.”

“I must have been out that week.”

“It’s also the snake charmer song, ‘Dee dee
dee
dee dee . . .’ ”

“Oh. Is the song significant in some way?”

Luc laughed. “I have no idea.”

“Do you know if it’s old? Would this be original to this room?”

“I wouldn’t be surprised. You know how kids’ culture keeps old things alive, like that ‘Ring Around the Rosy’ song.”

“Which song?”

“Were you homeschooled, by any chance?”

“Kind of.”

“ ‘Ring around the rosy, pocket full of posy’—it’s a holdover from the plague days. Ring around the rosy is the pox; a posy was to stave off the disease, something like that. Ashes actually referred to cremation of the bodies.”

“And little
children
repeat this?”

Luc took my hands and guided me in a circle, as he chanted:

I wrenched my hands away. There was an odd look on Luc’s face, and something off about his vibrations.

The gleam in his eyes was too beautiful, strange, seductive.

As I watched, wary, Luc seemed to shake it off.

“This place really is . . . odd. Do you think the noises were related to our being in here?”

Another strong floral scent, a sensation that we were not alone, and more cold air.

I nodded.

“Where did all this stuff come from again? And why do you suppose the door was blocked by a bureau?”

“Marlene Mueller told me they couldn’t find the key, so it was closed up and no one came in, probably for decades.”

“That doesn’t explain why it was all put in here in the first place.”

“Aren’t you supposed to give up all your worldly possessions when you join a convent? Perhaps the girls arrived from France as novices, and their things were stored here, then forgotten.”

“I went to Catholic school. You’re telling me those sour-faced nuns wore this sort of thing under their habits?”

Luc held a petticoat up to himself. The odd juxtaposition of such a manly man in the lacey white ruffles made me smile.

“I don’t think it was considered sexy lingerie back then,” I pointed out. “Just plain underwear that no respectable woman would go without.”

“Uh huh,” he grunted, unconvinced.

“Could I ask you . . . what were you and Jerry Becker arguing about last night in the café?”

He shrugged. “The usual. Jerry was under the impression he could control everyone he met. He was wrong.”

“How did you know him?”

“His daughter’s in a couple of my classes.”

“I heard he wanted you to help her get a show at a gallery?”

He nodded. “You heard right. But my refusal didn’t bother him nearly as much as Andromeda’s posing for one of my sculptures.”

“Why would he object to that?”

“He didn’t. He wanted a cut of the money I got for the sculpture.”

“And you refused?”

“Absolutely. It doesn’t work that way. I paid Andromeda for her time, and when it sold, I offered her a portion of the profits toward her tuition. She declined; said she didn’t need the money.”

“Oh.”

“Mostly I think Becker thought Andromeda and I were having an affair. And that’s what bothered him—I didn’t fit into his game plan for her.”

“But you weren’t seeing her?”

He gave a bark of laughter. “No. She’s not my type.”

“What
was
Becker’s game plan?”

“Walker Landau.”

I was still sorting through the items in the trunk, but that brought me up short.

“Walker Landau? The . . . um . . . thin fellow?”

“The very one.”

“Becker wanted Andromeda to be with Walker?”

He nodded.

“Why on earth . . . ?”

“I have no idea. I barely knew him, but it seems to me Jerry was a goal-oriented kind of guy. He had his reasons for manipulating his friends and family.”

“How odd.”

“Listen, do you still want these clothes? I’ll help you take them downstairs, if you like.”

“Actually, I’d like to speak to Walker Landau before I go. Do you happen to know if he’s around this late, and on a Sunday?”

“Probably. He’s like the rest of us, here all the time. When you’re an artist, your work is also your fun, so there’s not much point in going elsewhere. Why are you investigating Becker’s death, exactly?”

“I’m not, really. Marlene asked me to look into . . . whatever’s going on here.”