Wolf Moon Rising (28 page)

en she

laughed. “Sure. I will if you will.” She was the happy sweet girl

again, so normal and silly as they pulled on their coats and

climbed out of the car. She ran behind him and took his hand.

Th

ey walked down the road beneath the barren trees and

turned in at the gate. Night was falling, but they could still see

the tombstones with their alien shapes and the spaces between

them fi lled up with snow. Jackie stopped to stare at the same

statue of an angel that had protected her from the boys, and she

caught her breath and blanched as though she were seeing a

ghost. All the joy seeped out of her face.

“Who is she?”

“I don’t know. Some family member who died in the eigh-

teenth century.” He leaned over and pushed the snow off the in-

scription. “Angelique Bouchard,” he read, “October 1772– December

1796. Love Sleeps in Death’s Embrace.”

Th

e angel stared down at them, her arms reaching out in a

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gesture of supplication, her shoulders caped in white and her

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wings high and laden with snow. Jackie looked at her and shiv-

ered, frightened by the sorrowful gaze in the all too human

eyes.

“Come on,” David said, and tugged Jackie toward the mau-

soleum. He was being pulled by what felt like a giant magnet, a

vision in his brain of a fl at square thing wrapped in a blanket.

His triumph with the automobile had left him brimming with

confi dence and her nearness had infl amed his resolve. Th

ey

wound their way through the marble columns and odd obelisks,

sometimes stopping to look at the dates faintly legible on those

most decayed: 1692, 1795, 1864. He was breathless when they

reached the two pilasters and the wrought iron gate beneath the

stone words collins mausoleum and tramped up the stairs

through the heavy snow. Skeletal fi ngers of vines clasped the

bars, and David pulled aside thorny branches in order to fi nd

the latch.

A damp and musty odor permeated the room and their foot-

steps echoed like faraway cymbals. Th

e silence hovered in the

gloomy interior as if time had ceased to fl ow, and cold seemed to

seep from the walls. Th

e vault contained three dark caskets and

an iron candelabra with overfl owing tapers; pools of clotted wax

and decayed bouquets of fl owers were strewn across the pavers.

Jackie was griping his arm. “Why did you want to look in

here?” she said. “Th

ere’s nothing but dead people, and they don’t

know anything.”

“Why? Did you already ask them?” David said, and grinned

when she playfully smacked his arm. When David saw that the

tomb was empty, his chest caved a little. He had been so cer-

tain.

“Wait,” he muttered to himself, “I think there’s another

room, but I don’t know how to get inside it.” He felt around the

arched area that resembled a door, but nothing gave way. Th

en

he looked up at the carved head of a lion staring down at them

above the portal.

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Lara Parker

“Pull on that,” Jackie whispered, and pointed to the iron

ring in the lion’s mouth.

David looked over at her and winked.

Th

e ring was cold in his fi ngers and tight in the stone. He

jerked but nothing happened, and he was about to give up when

he heard a faint grinding, and one of the steps to the portal

shifted slightly. He pulled harder. A smell of decay oozed out of

the opening. He turned back to Jackie, and she was nodding.

Th

e inner sanctum was too dark to see anything and David

waited, hoping to discern some shapes. “Stay here,” he said, and

he inched slowly into the room, his hands out in front of him,

and he shivered when his fi ngers came upon the edge of another

coffi

n, its rolled lid and carved sides slippery polished wood.

His mouth felt dry, and his courage deserted him when he

thought of the dead man lying inside. He wanted to run as fast

as he could away from this place, but still he could see his vision of the portrait so clearly that he resisted the urge to turn around.

His legs were like water, as he forced himself to ease his body

past the casket, holding on to it and keeping himself upright just

in case he tripped. But he found nothing but an empty room.

Slowly, his eyes became accustomed to the light and he was

startled to see the casket was open.

“Jackie,” he said. “Look at this. It’s empty.”

She slipped in by his side and they both stared down in to-

tal amazement at the silken red interior.

“What could it mean? Who was buried here?”

Th

ey both had the same thought, but he was afraid to say it.

“Barnabas,” she whispered.

“Do you think that was his coffi

n?”

She nodded.

“Th

en that can only mean . . . he’s—”

“Hadn’t you guessed? He’s . . . he’s one of the living dead.”

“You mean he’s . . .”

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“A vampire.”

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David reached for her and pulled her face against his chest.

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Both were trembling. “Don’t think about it,” he said. “Maybe it

isn’t so.” But he couldn’t help but remember Dr. Blair and his

accusations. “Let’s get out of here.”

Both feeling shaky, they closed the door to the inner vault.

David tried to change the subject. “I thought we would fi nd it. I

could see the painting in my mind, in the dark, leaning against

the stone wall. Isn’t that what you saw?”

She thought a minute. “Th

ere was a dirt fl oor.”

Jackie was more sober now as they walked back towards the

car. She stopped to read the inscriptions on the tombstones. “So

many children,” she said, sighing. Th

e marble carving of a baby

rested in a basket of stone ferns. “Only three months. She lived

only three months.”

“Here’s another.” said David. “Oh, I remember hearing of

her. Sarah Collins, six years old when she died of pneumonia.”

Th

e wind whispered through the bare- limbed oaks and the

sky hung between the branches like pieces of torn sheet. Th

e

sun had dropped below the trees, and darkness was setting in.

David felt defl ated, like something brilliant had come to an

end, and he thought he had ruined the excitement of the day,

the beautiful car, and the thrilling ride with Jackie beside him.

Somehow, he had hoped for more. He reached for her hand and

she gave it to him reluctantly. Together they trudged through

the snow, their shoes crunching, and their breaths puff s of va-

por, until, growing impatient, she pulled away and wandered off

through the gravestones to read the other inscriptions.

All the gravestones shifted in the pale light, and the ceme-

tery was alive with phantoms, snow fl urries like ghosts swirling

around them, as if restless spirits had awakened in the dusk and

were readying for the night. He could see the car through the

gray mist— its luminous color; its high, majestic frame; the ele-

gant curves of the fenders; and the glimmering chrome. For a

moment the car was another vault, attached to the cemetery,

another depository for some deceased patron celebrated in life.

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He turned back to look for Jackie and saw her standing among

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the tombstones, small and fragile, her coat wrapped around the

fl apper dress, her face grim. She was a specter as well, her sil-

houette dark among the falling fl akes. Th

en she called to him.

“Here’s another one.”

He followed her gaze. “What?”

“Another one of those stone crypts.”

It was a low vault with a rotting wooden door, abandoned,

and without a name on the cornice. “Not likely,” he said.

But once again, he took heart. Th

ey were detectives together

on a journey, following the call, insanely curious and excited.

Th

e ache in his rib cage nudged him as he felt what was now a

familiar longing to be worthy of her, to see her face light up with happiness.

When he reached the door, the opening was so low he saw

he would have to duck in order to crawl inside. He held on to

the heavy latch and jerked the frame on its rusty hinges. It gave,

but with a horrid squeaking noise. He felt around for a casket

and found the fl oor was covered with rotten leaves that smelled of the forest in the summer. When his hand slipped beneath them,

they were warm, and there was something furry there, alive and

wiggling. He jerked back and shrieked as a rat crawled across his

wrist and over his leg. He tumbled back and fell in a drift as

three— no, four— more rodents nosed out, their thick bodies and

long tails slithering as they scurried off across the black snow.

“What was it?” said Jackie, helping him up.

“Rats.”

“Oh, God, David. Never mind. Don’t go back in there.”

“No, I have to.” He knelt down again and peered into the

tomb. Th

is time he turned around and felt about with his feet for

some object on the fl oor, and then, sucking in his breath, he reached inside and drew his hand along the damp slime of the walls. Th

at

was when he nudged something loose, and a heavy object fell

against his leg. He felt a jolt of excitement. Letting go of the latch

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he reached down in the dark, caught hold of the unwieldy article,

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and dragged it back outside where Jackie was waiting.

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“I told you we would fi nd it,” he said.

His heart was pounding. After brushing the debris from his

clothes, he leaned the thick frame against the wall, and then sat

down on the ground and tried to breathe. Jackie stared at him

for a minute, then walked over to the large object and tugged

away a wrinkled cover of damp blue satin.

At fi rst they could see nothing, only the dark shape of a

man, but as soon as she made out his features in the moonlight,

Jackie gasped and covered her mouth with her hand.

“Th

at isn’t it,” she said. “Th

at can’t be it.”

David only muttered, “Who else could it be?”

Th

inking to take a closer look, they trudged through the

gravestones carry ing the painting until they reached the automo-

bile where they were able to position the picture in the headlights.

Th

e rats had chewed away large areas of the canvas, a part of one

eye and half the cheek were completely gone, and only frayed

weaving gaped where the hands had been. “He looks pretty

rough,” David said unhappily. “Torn in half.” He reached down

and pulled the frayed edges together. “My God. Look at it.”

A man in a soiled cravat and a threadbare morning coat

glared out of the frame with a sinister expression. On the chest

were the medals, the brass buttons, and the piping, but the face

was not Quentin’s. It was the face of an ancient man with rheumy

eyes and thinning gray hair. Th

e fl esh hung on the skull, the skin

was sallow, and several teeth appeared to be missing. But the face

was more than aged. A malevolent sneer refl ected the worst sort

of debauchery, eyes yellowed from opium, and the jowls heavy

from drink. And yet the visage revealed a lecherous demeanor no

dissipation could hide.

“It’s Quentin,” said David shuddering, “but as a very old man.

What can it mean? Is this some kind of prediction of the future?”

Jackie shook her head and stared at the portrait transfi xed.

“No, not the future— it’s the past,” she said simply.

David appeared not to have heard. “He’s old and diseased

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and he looks like he’s done a lot of drugs.”

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“David, don’t you see? It’s the real Quentin,” she whispered,

and looked at David, waiting for him to follow her thoughts.

“You mean the painting grew old,” he said fi nally, “and

Quentin didn’t?”

She nodded, biting her lip.

“How can that be?”

“It’s enchanted.”

David shifted the painting and the moonlight crawled over

it, refl ecting the thick brushstrokes. “Look,” he said, “it’s doing it again!”

Like an overlapping fi lm, the portrait went though another

transformation. Th

e gray hair grew thicker and matted over the

large pointed ears. Th

e eyes grew swinish, like those of a car-

nivorous beast, and they peered out of a black muzzle— a snout

with grimacing teeth, canine teeth, sharp as picks and slimed

with saliva that almost seemed moist on the canvas.