Right Hand of Evil (34 page)

There was an inch of space in which nothing had been written, and then Loretta Villiers Conway's hand began again:

It is done.

I am married to the Monsignor by his own authority, for neither he nor Father were able to prevail upon our priest to marry us. Sister Mary Anthony came to our house after supper, and though she would not set foot indoors, she gave me a gift of two small crosses made of pure gold, which she said could protect me, and one of my children as well. Then she begged God to forgive me my sins.

I suspect that He will not.

Nor will He forgive Monsignor Melchior, for I believe I know the truth of what lies in our cellar. It is Evil itself that resides deep within that hole, and I fear the Monsignor has become its Servant.

I have this day married the right hand of Evil.

The Monsignor has ceded himself-and the eldest son of all the generations to come-to the Evil that dwells beneath this house, and I know we shall prosper on this Earth, but I know also that we are damned-
d
amned for all Eternity.

Why hadn't Cora cut from the Bible all the pages detailing the sins of the Conways? Even as he posed the question in his mind, he knew the answer: In Cora's mind, it was only this darkest secret that must be kept; all the rest might have been attributed to madness, but these first entries-the ones she'd hidden-proved the damnation of all the Conways' souls.

It was finally Monsignor Devlin who spoke. His voice quavered, as if the burdens of his years had suddenly grown heavier. "An exorcism," he breathed. "So that's how it started-an exorcism."

"A failed exorcism," Father MacNeill corrected. "He came to banish Satan, but gave up his soul instead."

Through the open window, the bells of St. Ignatius began to toll the darkest hour. Both priests shivered. An evil had been unleashed on St. Albans on a Halloween more than a century earlier. Now, on this Halloween midnight, had it spread over the town once more?

"Kimmie? Kimmie, come on!"

It was Jared's voice calling her name, and at first she didn't see him. Then she spotted him, fifty yards ahead of her, beckoning to her. They were in a meadow, and he was running toward a lake, and in a few seconds they would both plunge into the cool water, popping through the surface a moment later, laughing and splashing. She broke into a run, doing her best to keep up with him, but Jared was faster than she, and plunged into the lake before she could even get to the shore. She stopped at the edge of the water, watching to see where he'd come up, her eyes looking first one way, then another.

But he didn't come up.

"Jared!" she called out. Then again: "Jared?" When her brother still didn't appear, she ran a few yards along the lake's edge, first in one direction, then in the other.

"Mommy!" she called out. "Mommy, help! Jared's gone!"

But when she looked around, her mother was nowhere to be seen.

Then, as clearly as if she'd heard him shouting the words, Jared called to her again.

"Help me, Kimmie! Help me!"

With no thought but to save her brother, Kim dove into the water, plunging deep as she searched for her drowning twin. At first she saw nothing except sunlight filtering through the clear water, but as she plunged deeper and the light faded, she caught a glimpse of him.

He was far below, looking up at her, his hand extended as if reaching out to her. But as she watched, he sank deeper into the watery darkness, until she could hardly see him. She tried to dive faster, kicking as hard as she could, but no matter how fast she swam downward, Jared was always just a little beyond her reach. The water seemed to be turning to jelly around her now, and she struggled against it, straining to reach her brother before he disappeared completely. Then, for one fleeting moment, the tips of her fingers touched his. She tried to clutch at his hand, but he fell away into the blackness, disappearing.

Kim stopped swimming and let herself drift in the darkness. A great emptiness-as dark as the water surrounding her-yawned within her, and as she slowly let herself sink into it, the pain of not having been able to save her brother began to ease.

The darkness deepened.

Then, somewhere in the darkness, a point of light appeared. As Kim watched it, it slowly grew brighter. At first she thought she must be floating back toward the lake's surface. But when she finally opened her eyes, the water was gone.

She was back in the great cathedral-like chamber, which had somehow grown even vaster than before. Tonight there was no trace of the shimmering light she'd first seen here; tonight she felt as if she were utterly lost in the shadows that filled the huge space. Then, far ahead of her, she once again beheld the inverted cross, suspended in the shadowy light as if by some unseen force. Mesmerized, Kim moved toward it. As she did, the candles spread on the altar beneath the cross burst into flame. As the light grew, Kim saw the eviscerated body of an animal on the altar, a dagger plunged through its heart, its blood dripping into a silver chalice.

Two robed and hooded figures appeared at either end of the altar. They moved closer together, and for a moment her view of the altar-and the cross-was blocked. The two figures bent over, and a terrible feeling of apprehension came over Kim.

She tried to back away, but some unseen force held her in place.

Then the two hooded figures stepped aside and she once again beheld the cross.

A tiny figure, its face contorted in pain, was affixed to it.

Silver spikes had been driven through each wrist.

A third punctured the child's feet.

Blood dripped from a wound in the child's chest, oozing down the neck and face to mat into the already reddish hair.

Molly!

Kim screamed out loud, and in an instant that seared itself into her mind, the two robed figures whirled around.

Her father and her brother stood glowering at her, their faces contorted with hatred.

She screamed again, and jerked awake.

For a moment her head swam with the dying remnants of the dream. Her heart was pounding so hard she could hear it, and her skin was clammy with sweat.

A dream!
she told herself.
It was only a dream!

She eased herself back down onto the pillow and tried to erase the last fragments of the dream from her memory, but the faces of her father and brother kept looming up in the darkness, leering at her, almost taunting her.

She turned over in bed, but still the dream stayed with her, only now it was the twisted face of her baby sister she saw, hanging upside down from the inverted cross, impaled by the nails, her life slowly ebbing away.

Then the earlier dream came back to haunt her, the dream in which she'd seen Jared killing Scout.

She had convinced herself that it, too, had been just a dream. But when they'd gone to find Scout, he'd vanished from the house.

As the first faint light of dawn etched the sky with silver, Kim got up from her bed and tiptoed out onto the landing. The great house lay silent around her, and as she made her way around to Molly's room, she had the eerie feeling of unseen eyes following her.

She paused before the door, shivering in a sudden chill that seemed to come out of nowhere.

Finally, her hand trembling, she reached for the knob, twisted it, and slowly pushed the door open.

The chill reached deeper into her, touching her soul.

She stepped into the room, straining to catch a glimpse of her sister in the gray light of dawn, but all she saw was a mass of rumpled bedding.

"Molly?" she whispered, edging closer to the child's crib. "Molly? Are you okay?"

There was no movement at all from the crib. Kim, standing by its side, looked down at the tangle of sheets and blankets.
Please,
she prayed silently.
Please let her be all right.

She reached out, took the edge of the blanket, and pulled it aside.

And there lay Molly, sound asleep, her thumb tucked in her mouth.

Choking back a sob of relief, Kim bent down, gently kissed the sleeping child, and tucked the blanket back around her.

All Soul's Day

Jake Cumberland's cabin looked peaceful enough when Corinne Beckwith pulled into the little clearing next to the lake. Jake's hound was lying in the dust, and he sat up when she got out of the car, cocking his head as if trying to decide whether to sound an alarm. "It's okay," she said soothingly, moving slowly toward the dog with one hand extended. The dog stood up and edged closer to her, and Corinne made certain to stay just beyond the reach of his chain until he'd sniffed at her fingers, whimpered softly, then extended his tongue to have a lick. "Good boy," she said, bending down to scratch his ears as she gazed at the house. "I bet you're hungry, aren't you? Well, that's why I'm here. First we'll find you something to eat, then we'll start thinking about where you're going to live from now on." Though Corinne was certain the dog couldn't understand her words, something in her tone must have told him that his master wasn't coming back. Whining, the dog dropped down into the dust, and Corinne crouched beside him. "I know, boy," she said, stroking his coat. "You're going to miss him, aren't you?" Patting him once more, she stood up and turned toward the cabin. It looked utterly deserted this morning, as if it, too, knew that its sole occupant had abandoned it forever. Corinne took a step toward it, but then the dog was back on its feet, growling.

"Are you going to let me take a look, or are you going to try to rip my throat out?" Corinne asked. As she reached out to him again, the dog pressed himself against her legs, looked at her through bloodshot eyes. "Guess you're not going for the throat, huh?"

Corinne straightened up once more and continued toward the cabin, and the hound followed her. When she moved up onto the porch, though, he yelped, and when she reached for the doorknob, he barked loudly.

Corinne eyed the dog speculatively, uncertain whether the bark was a warning or the animal was merely eager to get inside. Unwilling to risk arousing the dog's guarding instincts, she moved to the window, shaded her eyes against the glare of, the morning sun, and peered inside. As her eyes adjusted to the relative gloom inside, she saw the strange designs that had been smeared on the cabin's wall with some kind of rust-colored paint.

Paint… or blood?

Feeling queasy, Corinne stepped back from the window. Her hand dropped to the hound's head. "Who was it?" she asked. "Who was here?" She stepped off the porch, fished in her purse for her cell phone, and a moment later was talking to her husband. "You better get out here, Ray," she told him. "Something terrible went on in Jake's cabin last night, and after what happened in the jail, no one's going to be able to blame this mess on him."

Twenty minutes later Ray Beckwith stood with Corinne in the center of Jake's shack, his expression grim as he studied the strange and bloody symbols that stained the walls.

"Looks to me like someone was out here doin' more of Jake's voodoo stuff last night."

Corinne nodded. The first thought that had come to her when Ray had told her of Jake's death was that someone had turned Jake's own magic against him. Though Corinne had no more faith in voodoo than in any other religion, she knew that for followers of voodoo, the knowledge that someone was casting a spell had sometimes resulted in the sickness-or even death-of the victim.

The power of suggestion: if you believed you could be killed by magic, then you could be.

And if someone had let Jake know what kind of ritual would be performed, and when…

Corinne could almost see Jake awaiting the hour in his cell, feeling the power of the voodoo "magic" surround him. His belief alone could have made him hang himself. But as she scanned the pentagrams and symbols on the walls, her eyes kept going back to a cross whose transverse bar was far below the midpoint.

A Christian cross, inverted?

"What about Satanists?" she asked.

Ray Beckwith groaned out loud. "Now you're starting to sound like Father MacNeill. Next thing, you'll be trying to blame this on the Conways, just like he did with the cemetery yesterday morning." He started toward the door.

"Where are you going? You haven't even searched the cabin."

"Gonna get the dog," Beckwith replied. "Maybe he can lead us right to whoever was here."

The hound made no objection as Beckwith replaced its chain a few minutes later with a strong leather lead he kept in the trunk of the squad car. But when he tried to coax it into the cabin, the animal turned recalcitrant, pulling and tugging at the leash as Beckwith tried to pull him through the front door. When the officer kept tugging, the hound snarled and snapped at him.

"Jesus!" Beckwith snatched his hand back just in time and glared at the dog. "What's going on with him?" he asked. "He musta been in here a million times before."

"Well, he's not going in now, and he didn't want me going in earlier," Corinne told him. "The question is, what does that mean?"

Beckwith scowled. "It means Jake had a stupid, stubborn good-for-nothin' animal here, that's what it means!"

"Or it means whatever happened in here last night scared him so much he doesn't want to go near the cabin," Corinne said.

Rechaining the dog, they went back into the cabin. As Corinne watched, her husband repeated the search he'd carried out the afternoon before.

Two minutes after he began, he lifted Scout's severed head from the trunk. "Oh, Jesus," he whispered. "Look at this."

As Corinne Beckwith's stomach threatened to betray her, she forced herself to look at the grisly object in her husband's hands. "I know that dog," she whispered. "It belonged to Jared Conway."

Morning did nothing to dispel the terrors Kim had felt the night before. As she came downstairs, fingers of panic still reached out to her. Although everything in the cavernous entry hall looked exactly as it had yesterday, it felt strangely ominous even in the morning light. Pausing at the bottom of the stairs, Kim found herself shivering, as if the terrible chill she'd felt at the door to Molly's room as dawn was beginning to break had now spread down the stairs. As she passed through the dining room on her way to the kitchen, she stopped to gaze at the trompe l'oeil mural her mother was painting on the wall opposite the windows. The perfectly executed French doors, the faux terrace, even the balustrade outside, looked exactly as they had yesterday afternoon, but now, with the sun flooding in the windows opposite, it looked as if her mother had done something to the garden beyond the terrace. Kim studied the mural for several minutes before she realized what had changed.

The garden seemed to be dying. The flowers that appeared so perfectly fresh and lifelike only yesterday looked this morning as if they were starting to wilt, and the green of the trees seemed to have faded, as if the painted foliage were somehow starting to turn brown. But why would her mother have done it?

Kim moved closer to the wall, to see if some kind of wash had been applied to the whole garden, but it was almost as if each flower, each leaf, had taken on a faintly unhealthy cast. The mural, which a day earlier had given the whole dining room a bright and cheerful feel, now sent a somber mood over the room.

Kim turned away.

As she pushed open the kitchen door, she unconsciously braced herself against Scout's enthusiastic morning greeting. In the fraction of a second it took for her to remember that Scout was no longer in the house, the strange feeling of unease she'd had as she came downstairs notched up. Turning on the stove and setting a pot of water to boil, she went to the back door, stepped out onto the porch, and called out to Scout. As she waited for the dog to respond, she sucked the morning air deep into her lungs, and felt some of the tension that had been building inside her start to abate. She called out to Scout three more times, and when the big retriever didn't appear, she went back into the house.

Her father and brother were in the kitchen now, standing at the counter, their backs to her. The memory of the two robed and hooded figures she'd seen in her dream came to mind, and when first Jared, then her father, turned to look at her, another memory snapped into focus. The expression she'd seen in their eyes-the terrible look of hatred-recurred to her.

The terrible vision dissolved as quickly as it had come as she realized that the "hooded robes" of her dream were this morning nothing more than the same bathrobes they wore practically every day.

"Where's Mom?" she asked.

"I told her to sleep in this morning," her father said.

Had a look passed between her father and Jared? She wasn't sure. She cocked her head, frowning uncertainly. "Is something going on? Something I don't know about?"

This time she was certain that Jared glanced at his father. Then he grinned at her. Not the friendly grin he used to give her, when they'd still been so close. This morning the grin had an edge to it.

"Going paranoid on us?" he asked.

Kim felt herself blushing. "I'm not paranoid," she said, too quickly. "I just-I don't know. Something just doesn't feel right."

"That sure sounds like paranoia to me, doesn't it, Dad?"

Kim's unease hardened into anger. Since when had Jared and their father gotten so buddy-buddy? Especially since Jared was supposed to have gotten a chewing out last night!

"I better go up and get Molly," she said, suddenly wanting to get out of the kitchen.

"She's still asleep, too," Ted said softly, in a tone of voice that stopped Kim short. She turned to look at him. Her father's eyes locked on hers. "You'd better just get ready for school, Kim," he said quietly. "If you don't hurry, you're going to be late." His eyes held hers a few seconds longer, then he smiled. "All right?"

Kim nodded silently and left the kitchen. As she went upstairs to get dressed, she had a vague feeling that there was something else she'd intended to do before she realized how late it was and that if she didn't hurry she wouldn't make it to school by the first bell. She dressed, still trying to remember what it might have been, but as she combed her hair, then gathered up her books, she decided that whatever it was, it couldn't have been important.

It wasn't until she was a block away from the house that she remembered Molly and the dream she'd had last night. She wondered if maybe she shouldn't go back to the house.

Just to be sure.

But if she did, she would surely be late to her first class.

And besides, the dream she'd had last night was only that-just a dream.

Wasn't it?

The two cars pulled to a stop in front of the Conway house, and both drivers got out. But as Corinne Beckwith started to follow Ray across the lawn toward the columned porch fronting the house, her husband held up a hand as if he were controlling traffic. "This isn't exactly a committee we've got here," he reminded his wife. "I think I can deal with this one alone, okay?"

Corinne glared at Ray. "If I hadn't gone out to Jake's to take care of that dog this morn-" she began. But her words died on her lips because something seemed off kilter. It was as if something were emanating from the house, something that left her feeling she didn't want to be here, after all.
It's just the light,
she told herself, peering into the shadows that darkened the porch. But it wasn't just a trick of the light; it was as if the entire house had taken on a dark cast; as if it held something unknown that even the structure's massive walls couldn't quite contain.

Why would anyone want to live in this place?
Corinne wondered as she let her husband continue-alone, and with no further argument-up to the porch. For some reason, just looking at the Conway house this morning made her shudder.

Ray Beckwith pressed the doorbell, and heard the sound of a muffled chime drift through the thick wood of the doors. He shifted his weight nervously from one foot to the other as he waited for the door to open. As the edginess that had come over him as he approached the house became more pronounced, he reminded himself that he was here on legitimate business; he had no cause to feel uneasy.

And yet, inexplicably, he did.

So far, he hadn't had a bad experience with Ted Conway. Sure, the man had been a little angry yesterday, but why wouldn't he be, with Father MacNeill practically accusing his son of defacing his own uncle's tomb? And when he'd gone out to Jake Cumberland's, Conway's idea had panned out, though he did still have some doubts about that. Now that Jake was dead, however, and if Corinne was right that the dog whose head they'd just found had belonged to the Conway boy-

His thoughts were interrupted when the door opened and Ted Conway appeared. For a moment Ray had the feeling Conway hadn't recognized him, but then the man smiled.

A smile that lit up his face, and made Ray Beckwith's nervousness evaporate.

"Hey, Ray, how's it going?" he asked. Then he spotted Corinne standing on the sidewalk. "May I assume by the presence of the press that this isn't purely a social call? Don't tell me you and Corinne have let Father MacNeill convince you that Jared's up to something!" The dazzling smile returned. Then he winked, as if the two of them were sharing a secret. "Or is it me again? Please don't tell me someone's cooked up some list of ordinances I've already violated. We're not even open yet! Won't be for months."

"Actually, it's a little more serious than that. Somethin' happened out at Jake Cumberland's last night." He told Ted what had happened to Jake last night, and what he and Corinne Beckwith had found in Jake's trunk.

"And when Corinne said you have a golden retriever, I figured I better come over here."

Ted Conway gazed steadily at the policeman. "So you think Jared took his own dog out to Jake's place and killed it." He shook his head almost sadly. "You sure you haven't been talking to Father MacNeill? It sounds exactly like the kind of thing he'd come up with." His voice hardened. "But it doesn't really make much sense, does it?" A frown creased his brow. "Except, of course, that Scout
is
missing. Jared let him out right after he got home last night, and he didn't come back in." He shrugged helplessly. "We figured there must be a bitch in heat somewhere in the neighborhood, and you know how dogs are. Once they get that scent, there's no stopping them, is there?"

Ray Beckwith shook his head. "No way," he agreed. "Sometimes they can be worse'n tomcats." He pulled a small notebook out of his jacket pocket. "You say it was Jared that let him out?"

"That's right," Ted replied. "In fact, I was with him. We were both in the kitchen. The minute Jared opened the door, Scout was off like a rocket."

"And what about your boy? He go out again?"

Ted shook his head. "It was already pretty late, and it was a school night, too. Besides, he wasn't feeling well-went right to bed after we gave up trying to get the dog back. Still feeling kind of flu-ish this morning, so we're keeping him home from school. But I'll tell you what-how about if I have him give you a call once he's feeling a little better? Then you can ask him anything you want."

Ray Beckwith closed the notebook and tucked it back into his pocket. "Don't really see that that'll be necessary," he said. "Seems like you've pretty much told me what I need to know. Sounds like someone came across the dog and took him out to Jake's. Used it for some kind of voodoo ceremony. I guess someone really had it in for Jake-"

"Or for us," Ted Conway interjected. "Maybe whoever did it used Scout for a reason." His eyes fixed on Beckwith.

The sheriff frowned as he turned Ted Conway's words over in his mind. Then he thought he understood what the other man meant. "You mean Father Mack?" he asked.

Ted Conway shrugged again. "You said that, Ray," he said softly. "Not me."

As Ted Conway's eyes remained steadily on him, Ray Beckwith wondered why he'd let Corinne talk him into coming over here. It was suddenly so obvious that the Conways didn't have anything to do with the vandalism, he felt he was just wasting time. "No sir, Mr. Conway," he said. "I'm sure not gonna let that happen." Shaking hands with Ted, he strode off the porch.

"Well?" Corinne asked anxiously. "Was it their dog?"

Ray nodded. "But none of them had anything to do with it, babe. The dog took off last night, and the boy was in bed, sick. Still is."

Corinne's lips pursed suspiciously. "Did you see him?"

"I didn't need to see him," Beckwith shot back. "You've been married to me long enough to know I can tell when someone's lying to me. Ted Conway wasn't lying."

Corinne's gaze shifted back to the house. Ted Conway was still standing on the porch, and as his eyes met hers, Corinne felt as if a wave of hatred had broken over her.

Suddenly, all Corinne Beckwith wanted was to get away.

As far away as she could.