The Seven Whistlers

The Seven Whistlers

About the Authors

Excerpt From
"Astray" From Ghosts of Albion: Collected Tales by Amber Benson and
Christopher Golden

Other Works by the
Authors

Rose Kerrigan stood in the sterile, white corridor of the
nursing home, her eye drawn to the large corkboard above the nurse’s station. She
scanned the board while she waited for the day nurse to finish dressing her
grandfather. The corners of her mouth turned up in an uncertain grin when she
caught sight of a flyer offering the sale of a “slightly used” set of
Encyclopedia Britannica.

She couldn’t help wondering where one of the guests at the
Valley Glen Rest Home would put an entire set of encyclopedias. If she went by
the size of her grandfather’s tiny room, they’d just have to pile the books
right on the hospital bed with the patient so there’d be space to walk in and
out the door.

The image of her birdlike grandfather sitting up in his
hospital bed surrounded by encyclopedias, a confused look on his grizzled face,
caused Rose’s smile to grow even wider. She knew it was a horrible thought but,
as with most horrible or silly thoughts, it just would not leave her brain.

“What are you smiling at?”

On the surface, the voice was rich and inviting, its honeyed
contralto deceptively lulling. Only with experience could Rose detect the harsh
note of condescension. Rose had spent her childhood learning every nuance of
that voice because knowledge was power. And knowing what mood corresponded with
what tone kept her safe.

There was only one person whose very voice could brew so
much tension in her — the voice of Isobel Hartung — the woman Rose
called Grandmother.

She turned, forcing a smile, and saw the old woman coming
toward her down the corridor, heels clicking on linoleum. Her grandmother wore
a neat, camel-colored sweater and linen pants. Her thick gray hair was pulled
back in a loose bun that only seemed to highlight the fine bones in her face. She
would have been beautiful, if she hadn’t been so cold.

“Your grandfather had an episode last night,” her
grandmother said. “I suppose the nurse has already spoken to you —”

Rose shook her head. No one had mentioned anything to her
about her grandfather having an episode the night before.

“Well,” Isobel continued, “apparently it was brought on by a
minor stroke, nothing that would kill him, but still, I don’t want you exciting
him this afternoon.”

Rose frowned. “I brought the book we’ve been reading; we’re
on the last chapter. It usually soothes him. I can’t imagine
Huckleberry
Finn
upsetting anyone . . .”

Her grandmother ignored her as if she hadn’t spoken at all.

“Just go in and tell him you have other plans for the
afternoon. He mustn’t be overtaxed, Rose. If you weren’t so oblivious, you
would see that.”

The old woman’s words struck her heart like serrated knives.
She hated that she let her grandmother affect her so strongly, but this was a
cycle that had begun in childhood, something Rose could not seem to overcome.

“But —”

“I have to speak with the doctor then I’ll be back to make
sure you’ve gone.”

With that, her grandmother turned on her exquisitely-shod
taupe-colored heel, and strode off down the hall. Rose watched Isobel’s
retreating back, her own body sagging slightly as the tension flowed out of
her.

God, how the woman makes me want to scream
, Rose
thought miserably, a migraine starting to eddy around the edges of her consciousness.
She slipped the book she had been holding tightly in her hand back into her
backpack.

Huckleberry Finn
was just going to have to wait for
another day.

Ever since her grandfather had moved into the home six
months before, Rose had made it her duty to visit him as often as she could. Though
the Alzheimer’s, which stole his memory, made it difficult for her grandfather
to even recognize the faces of his loved ones, Rose did not let it bother her. She
just showed up every few days armed with a thick book. If they couldn’t share
warm family memories, at least, she decided, they would share a good story. Even
when old Walt Hartung didn’t seem to recognize her, or confused her with his
own daughter — Rose’s mother — he seemed to take great pleasure in
the sound of her voice and her presence.

When Rose entered his room, her grandfather was sitting up
in bed, a small frown on his leathered face. Cathy, the day nurse, was putting
away the last of his soiled clothes, and gave Rose a wink as she stuffed a pair
of dirty socks into a small white laundry bag.

In a low voice meant only for Rose’s ears, she whispered, “I
heard the witch outside. I was prayin’ she wouldn’t come in ‘til I was long
gone!”

Rose nodded wearily.

“Sorry you got the worst of it,” she added, catching sight
of Rose’s pale face and furrowed brow.

“It’s all right,” Rose answered. “I’m used to it.”

“T’aint right,” Cathy said, frowning as she pulled the
string taut on the laundry bag, and moved toward the door. Again she shook her
head, tight blond curls bobbing. “That’s no way to treat your own blood.”

Rose tended to agree, but let the comment go as Cathy
exited, leaving her alone in the Spartan room with her grandfather.

“What’s that nurse yammering about?” her grandfather asked,
his voice catching in his throat like the air was having trouble escaping his
lungs. He was a bit hard of hearing, and was forever asking Rose to talk louder
or repeat what someone else had said.

“Nothing, Pappy,” Rose said, pulling a chair up to the
hospital bed and settling in beside him. He reached out and took her small
hand, holding it firmly inside his own weathered one. His skin felt like the
papery outer peel of an onion, dry and crackled.

“They’ll tell you I was sick last night,” he said, his
rheumy eyes starting to run a little at the sides. He seemed more agitated than
usual, making Rose afraid to answer him. He sensed her misgiving, and scowled.

“Don’t listen to a goddamned thing they say, girl. It wasn’t
sickness that had me last night,” he growled. “It was something else. Something
far worse than what your own body does to you when you get old.”

He clutched at Rose’s hand, almost hurting her with his
strength. She was surprised by this outburst. It was the most lucid she had
seen him in weeks.

“I don’t understa —” she began, but he cut her off
mid-word.

“There’s evil in the world, love. Things your young mind
can’t grasp, but believe me, they exist, lying in wait . . .”

“For what?” Rose asked, fear beginning to twist in her
stomach.

“For your soul . . . your
sinner’s soul
.”

He squeezed her hand, crushing the tiny, fragile bones that
rested inside the flesh.

“Ow! You’re hurting me, Pappy,” Rose said, her jaw clenching
in pain. He seemed to hear her because the pressure on her hand eased a bit,
but he still would not let her go.

She stared at him, willing him to return back to normal, but
the glazed look in the old man’s eyes told her that he was far from okay. She
followed his gaze, turning her head to where his eyes were fixed on something
just over her shoulder, outside the window. She saw nothing out of the ordinary
beyond the glass, just the skeletal brown of leafless trees and the muted gray
of the storm-pregnant sky.

“What is it, Pappy?” she said again. “What do you see?”

He let out a low whimper, tears beginning to leak from the
corners of his eyes. His face belied the strange memories that seemed to be
washing over his brain. This was the kind of lost, delusional gaze she’d had to
get used to with him. It broke her heart that she could not draw out from that shell
the man he had once been.

“Death’s on the hunt for me, Rose,” he rasped, fear
trembling in his voice. Terror shook him, and in that moment he seemed like a
small child, afraid of something in his closet, or the boom of a thunderstorm. He
crawled from his bed and tried to hide behind his granddaughter, staring at the
window. “They’re coming to collect, Rose, for all my sins. Please don’t let
them have me.”

Rose tried to calm him down, to make sense of his delirium. He
was frightening her. Still, she couldn’t help but feel a bit of joy. It was the
first time in over three weeks that her grandfather had called her by her given
name.

A sharp claw dug into her shoulder, pulling her up and away
from her grandfather.

“What have you done?” Isobel cried, a loose strand of hair
falling forward across her flushed face. She pushed Rose into the far wall, not
caring that the girl’s head slammed painfully against the windowsill.

‘I didn’t do anything —” Rose began.

Her grandmother fixed her with a glare malevolent enough to
stop Rose’s protests cold in her throat.

A doctor and two nurses burst into the room behind Isobel. One
of the nurses — a tall, dark-skinned man with a wild afro — slipped
a sedative filled syringe into her grandfather’s arm, pushing the drug into his
vein with cool efficiency.

“Go!” Isobel screamed as she pointed a bony finger in Rose’s
direction.

No one else paid attention to their interaction — the
doctor and nurses were still intent upon sedating her grandfather — so
they didn’t see the hatred that played across the old woman’s face, but it
chilled Rose to the marrow.

She didn’t need any more encouragement — the look was
enough. She turned and fled from the room.

There were no dreams while he slept. The sedatives kept them
at bay. His sparse white hair stuck in sweaty clumps to his scalp, his head
thrown back haphazardly against a pillow. Long, low snores escaped from the
back of his throat, almost waking him. From somewhere in the room came the
sound of a chair being pushed backward, its legs squealing against the cold
linoleum of the floor, and Walt Hartung awoke with a start.

The old man looked around, unsure of where he was. The room
seemed familiar, but he could not place it. Gradually, scraps of memory flowed
back, and he remembered this place. Other things came back to him as well, and
the fear returned.

He turned his head, saw that he was not alone, and found his
fear abated, if only for a little while.

“Bella . . . ?” he said his voice hoarse.

“I’m here, Walter.”

She still looks as beautiful as she on our wedding day
,
he thought as he stared at Isobel, who sat primly in a nearby chair. He reached
out his hand, and she took it in her own, massaging his fingers. Out of the
corner of his eye, he saw the beginnings of a large purple bruise starting to
form underneath the skin of his arm. Then he remembered the huge needle, and
the grim determination in the male nurse’s eyes as he jabbed the syringe into
the soft flesh.

“Don’t leave me,” Walt croaked. “Please stay with me,
Bella.”

She smiled at him, but her eyes were sad beneath long,
mascara-covered lashes. She squeezed his hand again, but did not reply.

“They’re coming for me,” he whispered, his heart hammering
inside his scrawny chest.

A sob escaped him, and great tears began to leak down his
face. Helpless to stop them, he turned his face against the pillow, wiping at
the tears as best he could. When he looked up at her again, Isobel pulled a
tissue from the box on the night table and dabbed at his face, careful not to
hurt him. There were no more words.

Finally she leaned forward and brushed her lips against the
cool of his forehead. She stayed like that for a moment, breathing in the smell
of his skin, then stood and pulled her hand from his, leaving the room.

Rose walked as quickly as she could through the trees,
cursing herself for taking the short cut through the cemetery. It was getting
darker, and she was usually coward enough to avoid the place during the light
of day, so why she had chosen to dare it when the moon was rising like a ripe
peach in the sky above her, she had no idea.