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Dare looked flummoxed.

“Oh, well, the microphones must have malfunctioned.”

“No, they didn’t,” said Case. “Not this one, at least. Here, watch.”

Within moments Case and Trawley appeared on the monitor screen as they entered the Great Room from a hall. Their footsteps, their quiet conversation, were fully and crisply audible.

Freeboard stared at the screen and shook her head.

“That’s just plain crazy,” she murmured. “It’s nuts.”

“But no poundings and no ghosts,” reminded Case.

“But I tell you we heard it!” Dare fumed. “There’s no question, it was absolutely there!” His cheeks had reddened.

“Yes, it’s certainly a puzzle,” Case agreed. “No doubt of that.” Working buttons on the video camera he’d connected to the television monitor, he was rapidly rewinding the tape. “But now here’s an even deeper one,” he told them. He was shaking his head. “I just don’t understand it,” he said. “Not at all.” Then at last he said, “There. There’s the spot. Now look at this. It’s from when we did the séance.” Case touched a little button and the tape ran forward. Once again the Great Room was projected on the screen. Near its center was the game table, with the Ouija board resting atop it.

The time code read 10:30
P.M
.

Freeboard gaped. “Hey, where are we? What’s going on?”

The planchette atop the Ouija board was in motion, desultorily gliding from letter to letter. But no one was seated at the table. There was no one to be seen in the room, in fact, except, for a moment, a large collie dog who appeared at the entrance to a hallway and then hastily scurried away and out of view. Dare stared at the screen, his face blanching, and Trawley was mutely shaking her head. “The date’s wrong,” the psychic murmured. She was staring at the date just below the time code. “It says 1998.”

“We’re not on the film,” said Freeboard dully.

She was staring at the screen, uncomprehending and lost.

Dare leaped to his feet. “Oh, well, for godssakes, this is ludicrous! Really! It’s mad! It’s clearly some sort of absurd mistake!” He looked over at Freeboard. The Realtor had jumped up with a wince of pain and began to move quickly away from the fireplace.

“Holy shit, I’m burning up!” she grimaced.

And then Trawley leaped up, and then Dare. “Where’s this godawful heat coming from?” he complained. He followed Freeboard and Trawley into the Great Room. Of them all, only Case seemed completely unaffected. He came to the library door and watched calmly, although not without a look of great interest and concern.

“Dear God!” Trawley cried.

With a look of surprise, she staggered backward a step, as if shoved by an invisible assailant. And then surprise was transmuted into gaping fear as she staggered yet another step back, and then another. “Someone’s pushing me!” she gasped. Another shove. “Oh, my God!” she started crying; “Oh, my God!”

And now the sound of a blow against the mansion’s outer wall.

“Oh, my Christ!” breathed Dare in terror. “Oh, my Christ!”

“I’m burning up, Terry!” cried Freeboard. “I’m burning!”

The pounding at the outer walls continued, thunderous, painful, penetrating bone. Lamps and tables began tipping over, scraping, sliding, hurtling through the room while huge paintings were ripped by a force from the walls and sent flying, spinning through the air of the Great Room as agony and madness descended upon it, on the house, on their bewildered, burning souls. “Someone tell me what’s happening!” Freeboard screamed, hands pressed against her ears and the torment of the poundings, and suddenly Trawley was shrieking in pain as a bloodless furrow slashed down her cheek, as if plowed by an invisible white-hot prong. A ritual chanting in Latin began, nightmarish, reverberant, and low, as if murmured by a hundred hostile voices, and then Freeboard was lifted by an unseen force and sent hurtling, shrieking, across the room to slam into a wall with a sickening final thud and crunch of shattered bone. Dare and Trawley couldn’t see anymore, all their blood had rushed up into their brains as now they too were seized by the force and carried up swiftly, spinning, toward the ceiling, spread-eagled, eyes bulging in terror, screaming, until they had slammed into the mansion roof and then plunged to the floor like crumpled hopes.

It was not a dream. It was real.

P
ART
T
HREE
: D
ÉJÀ
V
U

Chapter Twelve

T
he carved front door of the mansion burst open as if by the force of a desperate thought. “Holy shit, is this a hurricane or what!” exclaimed Freeboard. Sopping in a glistening yellow sou’wester, she staggered and tumbled into the entry hall with a keening wind at her back. She turned to see Dare rushing up the front stoop, and Trawley, carrying a bag, behind him, slower, deliberate and unhurried. A rain of all the waters of the earth was pelting down.

Freeboard cupped a hand to her mouth:

“You okay, Mrs. Trawley?” she squalled.

“Oh, yes, dear!” the psychic called back. “I’m fine!”

A booming thunder gripped the sky by the shoulders and shook it. Dare entered and dropped a light bag to the floor. “Joan, I owe you a flogging for this,” he complained. “I knew that I never should have done it.”

“Well, you did it,” Freeboard told him. “Now for shitssakes, watch your mouth, would you, Terry? I had to practically beg these two people to do this.”

She removed her yellow windjammer hat and then gestured to the open door, where the psychic seemed to falter as she climbed the front steps. “Terry, give Mrs. Trawley a hand,” ordered Freeboard. Dare snailed toward the psychic unhurriedly and reached for her bag with a drooping hand. “May I help you?”

“Oh, no thank you. I’m fine. I travel light.”

“Yes, of course. Tambourines weigh almost nothing.”

“
Jesus
, Terry!”

Trawley entered, took off her hat and set down her bag. “That’s all right,” she told Freeboard with a smile; “I didn’t hear it.”

Freeboard leaned into the wind and shut the door. In the silence, it was Dare who first noticed the music. “Dearest God, am I in heaven?” he exclaimed. “Cole Porter!” The author’s face was alight with a child’s pure bliss as from behind the stout doors that led into the Great Room drifted a melody played on a piano.

Dare stared. “My favorite: ‘Night and Day’!”

Freeboard moved toward the doors.

“That you in there, Doc?” she called out.

“Miss Freeboard?”

The voice from within was deep and pleasant and oddly unmuffled by the thickness of the doors. Freeboard opened them wide and stepped into the Great Room. All of its lamps were lit and glowing, splashing the wood-paneled walls with life, and in the crackle of the firepit flames leapt cheerily, blithe to the longing in the strains of “Night and Day.” Freeboard breathed in the scent of burning pine from the fire. The sounds of the storm were distant.

“Yeah, we’re here!” she called out. She smiled, moving toward the piano, while at the same time removing her dripping sou’wester. Behind her came Dare and, more slowly, Anna Trawley. Freeboard’s boots made a squishing sound. They were soaked.

“Ah, yes, there you all are again, safe and sound,” said Gabriel Case. “I’m so glad. I was worried.”

He had strong good looks, Freeboard noticed. The firelight flickered and danced on his eyes. She saw that they were dark but wasn’t sure of their color.

“This storm is amazing, don’t you think?” he exclaimed. “Did you order this weather, Mr. Dare?”

“I ordered Chivas.”

Dare and Freeboard had arrived at the piano and stopped. Anna Trawley hung back beside a grouping of furniture that was clustered around the fireplace. She was glancing all around the room with a vaguely uncertain and tentative air.

“Are you a ghost?” said Dare to Case.

Freeboard turned to him, incredulous, her eyes flaring.

“What crap is this?” she hissed in a seething undertone.

“That’s how they show them on the spook ride at Disneyland,” said Dare, not lowering his voice: “a lot of spirits dancing while a big one plays piano.”

Abruptly Freeboard put a hand to her forehead. “This has happened before,” she said, frowning.

Case raised an eyebrow. “What was that?”

“I’m having déjà vu,” Freeboard answered, troubled.

“This is neither the time nor the place,” snapped Dare.

Freeboard put her hand down and looked at him oddly.

“Jesus, Terry. I knew you were going to say that.”

“How could you?”

“And I knew what Dr. Case was going to say.”

“That’s incredible,” said Case. He lifted his hands from the keyboard. “Déjà vu reflects backward, not forward,” he said. He turned his head slightly and looked past Freeboard. “Ah, here—”

“Comes Morna.”

Dare and Freeboard had said it together with Case.

Case stared. He glanced to Morna for a moment—she was standing close by—and then stood up, looking mildly puzzled.

“How on earth could you have known Morna’s name?”

“I don’t know,” said Dare. He looked perplexed.

“It’s all happened before.”

At the quiet voice, they all turned and saw Trawley in a chair by the fireplace. Her haunted stare was on Case.

“You too?” Dare asked her.

The psychic turned to him and nodded. “Yes.”

Freeboard lowered her head into a hand.

“Hey, wait a minute, guys. I’m getting weirded out.”

“Yes, it truly is amazing,” said Case. “Awfully strange.” He continued to stand behind the piano, but his arms were now folded across his chest. He seemed somehow not a part of the group, but an observer, detached, as if watching the unfolding of a play.

Freeboard put a hand to her head, walked sluggishly over to a sofa and sat on the back of it. “I’ve got to sit down,” she said weakly. “I’m feeling so tired all of a sudden.”

“Now that you mention it,” said Dare, “ditto.” He headed for the furniture grouping. “What is it?” he wondered aloud. “I feel utterly drained for some reason. And I’m feeling disconnected from things.”

Freeboard nodded. “Yeah, me too,” she said softly.

Dare sat down on the sofa behind her.

“What is it, Joanie? What could it be?”

“I don’t know.” Abruptly Freeboard winced, as in pain. “Jesuspeezus, my head!” she complained.

“Is this house playing tricks with us already, Dr. Case?” Dare asked. “I mean, presuming there are tricks to be played.”

Inscrutable, Case glanced over at Trawley and asked, “What’s your read on all this, Anna? What do you think? Are you having the same reaction?”

Trawley nodded.

Case unfolded his arms and scratched his head.

“Well, this is all too bizarre,” he said.

“You mean it’s creepy,” said Freeboard.

“It’s so hard to accept that you knew Morna’s name,” pondered Case.

Dare looked up. “What did you say?”

“Accept.”

And now Freeboard was staring at Case intently, her eyes growing wide with some jarring realization.

“Accept,” Dare murmured to himself.

The quiet word was affecting him strangely. Why?

“Just so baffling,” said Case: “Three people with the same déjà vu; with jamais vu, in fact.”

Freeboard rose from the back of the sofa, perplexity and nascent alarm in her eyes. “Hey, wait a second! What the fuck is going on here?” she demanded. Her tone was belligerent and angry.

“Yes, we’re trying to figure that out,” Case said blandly.

Freeboard strode up to him, stopped and examined his face.

“You’re not Gabriel Case!” she declared.

Dare turned to her, taken aback.

“What on earth are you saying, Joanie?”

“I’m saying this guy is a fake! He’s not Case!”

Dare looked at Case and became more confused, for he read his expression as fond, perhaps pitying.

“Are you bleeding mad, Joan?” he exclaimed.

Freeboard whirled on him.

“Terry, I’ve seen pictures of the man! I’ve talked to him!”

“Then why didn’t you say so in the first place?”

“Who gives a shit, Terry! Who cares! All I know is, this man isn’t Dr. Case!”

“Yes, it is!” insisted Dare.

“It is not!”

“It is! He looks
exactly
the same as every other time before: the same scar, the same—!”

The author abruptly broke off as the meaning of his words began to register upon him. “What on earth?” he whispered, shaken.

“Terry, what is it?” asked Freeboard tremulously.

She’d seen the look on Dare’s face and felt a dread.

“What in God’s name is happening to us?” breathed Trawley.

Stunned, Dare slowly stood up.

“This keeps happening again and again,” he said numbly.

Freeboard walked over to Dare, her face ashen.

“What is it? What’s wrong with us, Terry?
Tell
me!”

But the author was staring at Case, transfixed.

“Who are you?” he asked him in a weak, dead voice.

Freeboard and Trawley turned their heads to look at Case.

“Yes, who are you?” the psychic repeated dully.

Case scrutinized each of their faces intently. “Come with me,” he said gravely. “1 have something to show you. I think that perhaps you’re now ready. Will you come? We’ll just go for a pleasant little walk on the beach.”

The trio stood motionless and silent. Something submissive had entered their beings. Their eyes and their postures had changed. They looked crumpled.

Case turned a kindly look to Freeboard.

“You seem tired, Joan,” he said to her gently. “Are you tired?”

She shook her head mutely.

“Then come,” said Case. “Let’s go.”

Staring and moving as if in a reverie, the trio followed Case outside. It was dawn but a heavy fog enshrouded them. Another storm was on the way: swift gray clouds scudded low above the river, and far to the north they could see dim lightning flashes, brief bright souls in the dark. Case escorted them in silence through the grove of oaks and to the path along the river where Trawley and Freeboard once ventured but then mysteriously had stopped. And now, as they neared the sharp bend in the shoreline, it was Dare who first halted, staring quietly ahead. The others stopped with him, uncertain, apprehensive. A gusting breeze ruffled Trawley’s dress.

“Do you wish to continue?” Case asked softly.

No one answered. No one moved. Then at last it was Freeboard who broke away from them and strode toward the curve in the shoreline. One by one, then, slightly faltering, the psychic and the author followed. Apprehensive but satisfied, Case stayed behind. He looked to his right. Then he walked to a marshy, reeded area, where he parted a clump of brush and stared sadly at the tiny, sun-bleached skeletons of what appeared to have been two dogs. He looked up at a sound from around the bend. A horrified shriek. Freeboard. Case sighed and looked regretful, shaking his head. He hastened to catch up with the others.

Around the bend Anna Trawley had fainted. Their eyes wet with tears, Dare and Freeboard helped her up, and then together, legs trembling, they walked toward the shore where they stood and stared mutely at the rusted wreckage of a capsized motor launch whose name, though blistered and faded, could be read:
Far Traveler
.

A tiny sob escaped Trawley.

“We’re all dead,” said Freeboard numbly.

Dare nodded his head, looking dazed.

He said, “We died in the storm coming over.”

“That’s correct.”

They turned and saw Case coming toward them. When a few yards away, he stopped and surveyed them, and then said to them:

“
You
were the ghosts haunting Elsewhere.”

With a whimper, Trawley slumped and fell back against the wreckage. Dare reached out a trembling hand to Freeboard.

“Hold my hand, love,” he said, his voice quavering slightly.

Freeboard took his hand and gripped it firmly.

“It’s okay. I’m with you, Terry,” she said.

“And I with you.”

Case appraised them for a moment, then spoke. “I never quite completed my history of the house,” he began. “I don’t suppose you’d like to hear it.”

“Oh, now, stop that,” snapped Dare, recovering. “Bad enough to be dead without having to stand in the damp and hear tired old rhetorical devices. Could we simply go on with it, please?”

Case smiled. “For the longest time—years after their death—Edward and Riga Quandt haunted the mansion, frightening and unbalancing the tenants, even killing a few, by the force of their hatred and rage at one another. But by the middle of the eighties they had made their peace, accepted their deaths and decided to move on. But then four years ago,
you
came. You and the launch captain died coming over. The captain moved on. You three didn’t. Or, to be more precise—you
wouldn’t;
you refused to accept that you were dead.”

“Yes, I know that now,” Dare sighed. “I understand. I see everything clearly now. Very clearly.”

“In that case you can explain why you refused to accept your death,” Case challenged. “Can you do that, Mr. Dare?”

“Yes, of course. I was terrified that death meant damnation.”

Case nodded. “Quite so. And you, Anna? Can you see what held you back?”

“Only dimly, I’m afraid.”

“You’d grown addicted to your grief for your daughter.”

“Oh, dear God!”

“Strange attachments that we make, don’t you think?”

Trawley shook her head. “Could that really be so?”

“Am I some kind of orphan here?” Freeboard said testily.

“Oh, Joan,” said Case.

“Oh, yeah, Joan.’ Cheezus-peezus,” she grumbled.

“You were terrified of dying,” Case told her.

“Shit, so’s everyone. Come on, now. What else?”

“You couldn’t bear to let go of your toys,” Case said gently.

Dare turned to her loftily and sniffed, “So immature.”

Freeboard glared.

“And what now?” Trawley asked. “Do we leave here?”

“That’s entirely up to you,” replied Case. “You may choose to cross over or choose to stay. In the meantime, my assignment here is mercifully finished.”

Freeboard wrinkled up her nose. “Your assignment?”

“Yes, Morna and I—we were sent here to lead you to discover the truth. Each time in the past that you almost confronted it, you’d reject it and then start the whole cycle all over, reliving again and again your first arrival here at the mansion; all but the shipwreck, of course; you blocked that out, just like everything else that would bare your delusion. That’s why you had no memory of your walk on the beach, Joan, because you knew around the next bend was
Far Traveler
. Incidentally, you’ve been acting out this fantasy for years, dear hearts, even
after
we arrived here to help. Stubborn sorts!”