The Manor (16 page)

She was about to reach up a corner of the towel to wipe the mirror when the room grew even colder, as if a wind had crept through the crack beneath the door. Her blurred face in the mirror breathed mist. Then the water colecting on the mirror ran in streaks, and Anna didn't believe her eyes. Because even some-body who saw ghosts didn't see things like this.

Letters formed, as if drawn by the tip of an invisible finger, the symbols silver in the soft glow of the lamp. G-O.

Anna saw her own wide eyes reflected in the word, as the second set of letters etched itself against the sur-face of the mirror. O-U-T.

"Go out?" Anna whispered, now that her mind trans-lated the symbols into words. Was this a message of some sort? From whom? Go out from where? Did something want her out of the house?

But another word was forming, even as the steam threatened to turn to ice and shivers stretched her skin tight.

F-R-O-S-T just above the rim of the mirror.

Anna fought down a breath, though her lungs were like frozen stones. Then the letters blurred, the cold steam collected and ran down the smooth glass in rivulets, and the words were gone.

"Go out frost," Anna said.

She toweled quickly and hurried back into the room to stoke the fire.

"It's going to be beautiful."

Miss Mamie gazed lovingly at the bust that Mason had carved. The sculptor was gifted. Ephram had cho-sen wel. But Ephram had always chosen wel, in love, in life, and now in death.

"Mr. Jackson worked late," Lilith said, holding the lantern higher so the light caught the angles of Korban's hewn features.

"He won't be down for a while."

Miss Mamie ached to fondle Korban's face, but she didn't dare risk drawing any of its energy away. That wasn't for her. That was for Ephram. She would touch him again soon enough. The blue moon was only two nights away. Lilith went to the corner of the studio space and lifted an oil painting. "This was my favorite," she said.

"Put that down. You're done with painting. And so is he. Know your place." Lilith returned the painting to the shadows. Lilith was just another servant, another tool that helped build Ephram's bridge back into this world. But Lilith's spirit stil hung in the air, an echo of the dreams she had cre-ated, dreams that fed Ephram and fueled his sleeping soul. She was like the others, too hungry for her own re-turn, too obsessed with her own escape from the tunnel.

She didn't know that she would never escape.

"You may go now," Miss Mamie said. "Help see to lunch. I'll be along shortly." Lilith took another forlorn look at the painting.

As if she would ever be as gifted an artist as Ephram,
Miss Mamie thought. Oh, Lilith had tried, she'd sacri-ficed, but she was just starting to learn the basics when she'd drowned in the pond below the barn. Her tunnel of the soul always led back here, to this dark basement where she had once dared to create.

Lilith climbed the stairs and closed the basement door.

They were alone.

"Oh, Ephram," Miss Mamie said to the bust. "It's better than I ever dreamed." The oak flexed and stretched, the eyes twitched be-tween their wooden lids. Then the lips parted. "Yes. The fit is rather nice."

She squatted so that she was at eye level with him. She stroked the rough cheek, ran the back of her hand along the engraved beard.

"It's working," she whispered. "Just as you said."

The stiff brow lifted. "It's going to take a little get-ting used to. Soon, Margaret, my love, I'l have arms to hold you again. Hands to paint with, eyes to see the world anew, legs to walk beside you. But the sculptor must work harder. I need to be finished in time."

"I'll make him start this evening." She wondered what those arms would be like, once Mason Jackson finished the life-sized statue. They might be crude and clumsy. But even wearing wooden flesh was better than
being trapped in the
damp stone, bleak walls, and cold
glass of the manor. Ephram could eventually use his magic to soften the wood, tame it, and make it tender.

He was gaining power as the blue moon approached. She could sense it, as if he were a bed of embers on the edge of erupting into hot flame. He was summoning his fetches, those who had died under his spell, those who feared the dark slithery things in the tunnels of their souls. He ate their dreams and fed them fear. And she had helped by carving their poppets, which were hidden away in that old cabin on Beechy Gap, and their souls could never leave the mountain.

"Soon," Miss Mamie said, the word like an ache, a long promise.

This was the end of decades of waiting, of dark deeds and death, of ploting, stealing, enslaving. Time was nothing to Ephram, but Miss Mamie stil clung to the impatience of mortality. Possession worked both ways, its tug equaly strong on the living and the dead.

Ephram's wooden lips pressed together, then stretched into a smile. "It weakens me to leave the wals."

"You'l be whole again. Two more nights."

"And Anna?"

"She's weak. Dying "

"Ah. Sweet dreams."

The bust grimaced, eyes closed, forehead creased in concentration. "Make him finish me," Ephram said with effort.

"Mr. Jackson has passion," Miss Mamie said. "He loves you. He worships you. He wants to please you."

"He worships only the flesh of his work. But no mat-ter. His spirit is mine."

"We all belong to you. They dream of you."

"As they should."

"And after you've lured Sylva to the manor—"

"You're not to mention her name." The bust's eyes opened, flickering in bands of orange and red. She cringed, waiting for Ephram to punish her, give her back the years, steal away the gift of youth. She knelt, head bowed, tears streaming down her face.

"Do you know why I've never led you through your tunnel of the soul?" Ephram said, voice cold, long dead, and almost weary.

Miss Mamie wiped her eyes and sniffed in hope. "Because you love me?" That was the only dream worth having, the only dream that would last beyond death. Love absolved them of evil, made the kilings and the soul tricks and the torture of dead things al worthy and noble. Love forgave what God could not.

Ephram's laughter was abrupt and harsh, crowding the stale air of the basement. She looked into his cruel, hot eyes.

"No, no, no," he said, more comfortable now in the wood, seeping into the angles and grooves and shaved spaces until it was
his
face. "I spare you because I need you. You're the one person I know will never betray me." Sylva had betrayed him, though Miss Mamie wasn't going to remind him. His anger at Sylva might become misplaced again, as it so often did. But Miss Mamie might find out the one thing that bothered her, if she asked the right questions.

"I have to know," she said, breathless, the room sti-fling. "Do you love me the most?" The bust sighed. Miss Mamie wondered if a dead man was capable of lying. No, not Ephram. He never lied, and he always kept his promises.

"Margaret, there is only you. Forever. Why do you think I've lingered here, chained my soul to this house with you?" If only she could be certain. But a house of love wasn't built on a foundation of doubt. "Then why have you kept Sylva alive, too?"

Silence filed the basement, the shadows waiting im-patiently at the edge of the lantern's glow. She had only dared chalenge him because she knew, with the blue moon approaching, that Ephram needed her more than ever. And she wanted them to possess each other, mind, body, and spirit. No secrets.

"I kept her old," Ephram said. "And I've never brought her into my heart. There's only room for you here, on the inside, the dead side. And soon, when I have legs, we wil walk both sides, together." Miss Mamie blinked back tears. How could she have doubted him?

She couldn't help herself, she leaned closer, held her face against the wood, scorched her skin against her lover's searing lips.

Then he was gone, back into the wals where the fire could warm his soul.

Mason woke just in time to miss lunch. His mouth felt as if it had a dirty sock stuck in it. Someone had stoked the fire while he'd slept. He dressed in his other pair of jeans and a plain red flannel shirt. He thought about the sculpture as he brushed his teeth, wondering if he'd really finished it in a single night. His studied his reflection in the bathroom mirror. Dark wedges haunted the flesh under his eyes. He wasn't used to keeping odd hours. He usualy folowed the "slow and steady" theory of work, but he'd never before been swept up in such a creative storm as he had while fash-ioning the bust. No wonder so many of the so-called "true visionaries" crashed and burned at an early age.

"Oh yeah, I'm a real visionary, all right," he said to his bleary reflection. "Double visionary." His reflection shimmered a little and he rubbed his eyes. A wave of dizziness struck him and he reached out to balance himself. One hand gripped the sink and the other pressed against the mirror. The glass was warm beneath his palm. For the briefest of moments, Mason saw the bust he'd sculpted instead of his own reflection, then the hallucination passed. Mason frowned and splashed some water on his face. It was bad enough seeing Korban everywhere on canvas, but if the bastard was going to swim nonstop before his eyes, then maybe Mason needed a break. Or a shrink.

The upper floors were quiet. Walking down the stairs, he heard clattering noises rising from what he figured was the kitchen. Maids had carried food through the door to the left of the stairs. He wondered if anybody would mind if he ducked in for a snack.

Mason poked his head through the swiveled door. A plump, dour woman wrestled with a cast-iron skilet at the sink. A froth of soap bubbles clung to one cheek.

"Hey there," Mason said. "Is it okay if I grab a quick sandwich?" She glared at him, through him. He looked over his shoulder. When he looked back, she gave a terse nod to a counter by the stove. A loaf of homemade bread sat on a cuting board, three or four white slices stacked to the side. Most of lunch had been cleared up and put away, but the odor of fried trout still hung in the air. Mason passed a long cookstove with its thick metal grill. There was a door on each side for stoking wood, and a wide door in the middle for a baking oven. A smaler stove stood off near the corner, its pipe running up and making an elbow through the wall. Mason marveled that anyone could cook at al on these primitive appli-ances, much less create feasts lavish enough for the manor's pampered guests.

Mason picked up two slices of bread. "Anything to put between these?" The cook glowered and wiped a butcher knife with her towel. "There, in the icebox," she said in a thick Bavarian accent, pointing the knife toward what looked like a squat highboy with doors instead of drawers. Mason opened one of the doors, and cool air wafted over his face. On the metal shelves were some eggs in a basket, a thick wheel of cheese, a pitcher of cream, a boned chunk of cooked ham, and assorted fruits and vegetables. A block of ice sat on the highest shelf, its corners rounded from melting. Water dripped into a catch pan at the bottom of the icebox.

Mason pulled out the cheese and ham and placed them on the counter, then took a small knife from a wooden holder. He cut a couple of slices from each, then stacked them on a piece of bread. He could feel the cook's eyes on his back.

"Don't worry, I'll clean up after myself." Mason's smile evoked no change in her hard eyes. He puled a couple of leaves from a head of iceberg lettuce, added it to the sandwich, topped it with bread, and mashed the whole thing flat.

"That's how we do it down in Sawyer Creek," he said, taking a bite. The cook frowned and returned to the dirty dishes. That's when Mason saw the painting on the wal above the door. Another portrait of Korban. This one done in deep shadows, those eyes as cold as in all the other paintings. Was there a room in the house that didn't have that man's unrelenting scowl?

A coffeepot rested on the smal cookstove. Ceramic coffee mugs hung from hooks on a rack near the sink. Mason stepped around the counter and reached for one.

"Pardon me," he said, as the cook flinched. Mason lost his balance, stil groggy from his cheated sleep. He put out his hand to avoid faling into her.

When he touched her shoulder, she gave a screech and dropped a plate. It shattered on the floor. Mason stepped back and looked at his hand.

No. That couldn't have happened.

The door swiveled open and Miss Mamie entered the room. She wore a buldog mask of disapproval.

"Sorry, it was my fault," Mason said. He was about to add that he'd be happy to pay for the broken dish, then remembered that he didn't have any money.

"Gertrude?" Miss Mamie said. Her eyes seemed to grow even darker as the cook's face paled. The cook glanced at the portrait of Korban above the sink.

"No, realy, it was me," Mason said. "I was just get-ting a cup—"

"Guests normaly aren't alowed in the kitchen area, Mr. Jackson, for reasons I'm sure you'll understand."

"Uh, sure. I was just leaving." He collected his sand-wich and made for the door.

"Back to work now, Gertrude," Miss Mamie said. The cook immediately plunged her arms into the soapy dishwater, too afraid to stop long enough to sweep up the shards of broken ceramic. Miss Mamie held the swivel door open so Mason could pass, then followed him into the hall. "How do you like working in the basement?" she asked, once again cheerful, as if the incident in the kitchen had never happened.

"It's perfect," Mason said, continuing down the hal, still uneasy. "It's private, with enough room so I can swing my elbows around, and the wals and floor are insulated so I don't have to worry about bothering any-body."

"Lovely," she said. "Master Korban would be pleased."

"Stays a little warm down there, though."

"Wel, we simply must keep the central fire going. We pride ourselves on having hot water available twenty-four hours a day."