human witch! The entire Mayfair family was full of troublemakers! Mayfair design and Mayfair will were quickening my pulse. I think I even cursed Merrick, that she had planned to immolate herself last night on that altar, that she’d somehow found a way to save her immortal soul, and left me to my own usual damnation.
And then there was the ghost. The Mayfair ghost had returned to his corner. He stood there giving me the most malevolent look I’ve ever seen on any creature, vampire or human.
I took his measure: a male, aged sixty perhaps, short curly hair, snow white; eyes gray or black; excellent facial features and regal bearing, though why the age of sixty I couldn’t figure unless he’d felt most especially powerful at that earthly time of life, because I knew for a fact that he’d died long before Mona and could therefore haunt in any guise he chose.
These thoughts didn’t bait him. There was something so intrinsically menacing in his stillness that I couldn’t bear it.
“All right, then, be quiet,” I said firmly. I detested the quaver in my voice. “Why the Hell are you haunting me? You think I can undo what I’ve done? I can’t. Nobody can. You want her to die, haunt her, not me.”
No change in him.
And no way could I trivialize and diminish the woman who’d just waved to me before stepping into the car, salt of her tears still on my lips to be licked. So why keep trying? What had befallen me?
Big Ramona, who happened to glance in from the hall, drying her hands on her apron, said, “And now we have another madman talking to himself, and right by the desk that Grandpa William used to go to all the time for no reason. Now that was a ghost that Quinn used to see, and me and Jasmine too.”
“What desk, where?” I stammered. “Who is Grandpa William?” But I knew that story. And I saw the desk. And Quinn had seen the ghost over and over pointing to the desk, and they had searched it over and over, year in and year out, and found nothing.
Snap back, you idiot!
Upstairs Quinn tried tenderly and desperately to comfort Mona.
Tommy and the ever distinguished Nash came down for their dinner and passed, without noticing me, into the dining room across the way, their low conversation uninterrupted throughout, and seated themselves.
I went to the cameo case near the piano. That meant walking away from the ghost who was to my far right, but it made no difference. His eyes followed me.
This case was where Aunt Queen’s cameos were displayed, and it was never locked. I opened the glass top—it was hinged like the cover of a book—and I picked up an oval cameo with a tiny display of Poseidon and his consort in a chariot pulled by sea horses, with a god to lead them over billowing waves, all of this spectacular progress intricately wrought. Cool.
I slipped the cameo into my pocket and went upstairs.
I found Mona lying on the bed, crying dreadfully among the flowers, with a desperate Quinn standing by the far side of the bed, leaning over her and trying to comfort her. Quinn was more frightened than I’ve ever seen him. I made a quick gesture to let him know everything was working well.
The ghost wasn’t in the room. I could neither feel him nor see him. Cagey. So he doesn’t want to be seen by Mona?
Mona was naked, Lady Godiva hair everywhere, her body shimmering and fine as she lay sobbing among the poetic blooms; and the neat stack of Aunt Queen’s white garments had fallen and was scattered all over the floor.
For a moment I felt a deep stab of horror, a horror I deserved and couldn’t escape, and which I didn’t intend to confide to either Quinn or Mona as long as we all lived, no matter how many years or decades that might be; a horror of what whim and will can do and had done. But as usual with grand moral realizations, there was no time for it.
I looked at Quinn—my Little Brother, my pupil.
He’d been made by monsters he’d loathed and it had never occurred to him to weep in
And then there was the ghost. The Mayfair ghost had returned to his corner. He stood there giving me the most malevolent look I’ve ever seen on any creature, vampire or human.
I took his measure: a male, aged sixty perhaps, short curly hair, snow white; eyes gray or black; excellent facial features and regal bearing, though why the age of sixty I couldn’t figure unless he’d felt most especially powerful at that earthly time of life, because I knew for a fact that he’d died long before Mona and could therefore haunt in any guise he chose.
These thoughts didn’t bait him. There was something so intrinsically menacing in his stillness that I couldn’t bear it.
“All right, then, be quiet,” I said firmly. I detested the quaver in my voice. “Why the Hell are you haunting me? You think I can undo what I’ve done? I can’t. Nobody can. You want her to die, haunt her, not me.”
No change in him.
And no way could I trivialize and diminish the woman who’d just waved to me before stepping into the car, salt of her tears still on my lips to be licked. So why keep trying? What had befallen me?
Big Ramona, who happened to glance in from the hall, drying her hands on her apron, said, “And now we have another madman talking to himself, and right by the desk that Grandpa William used to go to all the time for no reason. Now that was a ghost that Quinn used to see, and me and Jasmine too.”
“What desk, where?” I stammered. “Who is Grandpa William?” But I knew that story. And I saw the desk. And Quinn had seen the ghost over and over pointing to the desk, and they had searched it over and over, year in and year out, and found nothing.
Snap back, you idiot!
Upstairs Quinn tried tenderly and desperately to comfort Mona.
Tommy and the ever distinguished Nash came down for their dinner and passed, without noticing me, into the dining room across the way, their low conversation uninterrupted throughout, and seated themselves.
I went to the cameo case near the piano. That meant walking away from the ghost who was to my far right, but it made no difference. His eyes followed me.
This case was where Aunt Queen’s cameos were displayed, and it was never locked. I opened the glass top—it was hinged like the cover of a book—and I picked up an oval cameo with a tiny display of Poseidon and his consort in a chariot pulled by sea horses, with a god to lead them over billowing waves, all of this spectacular progress intricately wrought. Cool.
I slipped the cameo into my pocket and went upstairs.
I found Mona lying on the bed, crying dreadfully among the flowers, with a desperate Quinn standing by the far side of the bed, leaning over her and trying to comfort her. Quinn was more frightened than I’ve ever seen him. I made a quick gesture to let him know everything was working well.
The ghost wasn’t in the room. I could neither feel him nor see him. Cagey. So he doesn’t want to be seen by Mona?
Mona was naked, Lady Godiva hair everywhere, her body shimmering and fine as she lay sobbing among the poetic blooms; and the neat stack of Aunt Queen’s white garments had fallen and was scattered all over the floor.
For a moment I felt a deep stab of horror, a horror I deserved and couldn’t escape, and which I didn’t intend to confide to either Quinn or Mona as long as we all lived, no matter how many years or decades that might be; a horror of what whim and will can do and had done. But as usual with grand moral realizations, there was no time for it.
I looked at Quinn—my Little Brother, my pupil.
He’d been made by monsters he’d loathed and it had never occurred to him to weep in
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